A Kind of Purgatory
by LauraHuntORI
Summary: An answer to the question of what happened between the elopement and the announcement.
1. Chapter 1

Author's Note: This story begins near the end of Season 2, episode 7, immediately after Tom Branson has closed the door of what is now only "his" room at The Swan Inn.

Disclaimer: I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their setting are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

In the first few seconds that Tom stood alone after closing the door, he was convinced that Lady Edith and Lady Mary had ripped out his heart and taken it away with Sybil. He had heard soldiers who had had limbs amputated talk about 'phantom' pain, and that was what this tearing sensation in his chest must be, a purely physical grief in an organ he no longer possessed. Almost immediately, he realized he was quite wrong: his heart was not gone, it was still in his chest. In fact, it was hammering, apparently in a mad effort to get out of his chest and follow Sybil. It pounded four or five beats, then slammed itself against his ribs. He put a hand up to his chest to hold it in, to soothe it. The gesture did no good. _Thud, thud, thud, thud-WHAM!_

He told himself to calm down. She had said she would stay true to him, that she had given him her heart. He tried to think of what he was going to do now, but was distracted by the fact that he couldn't breathe. No- that wasn't right, he definitely _could _breathe, he _was _breathing, in loud, ragged, sobbing breaths. Tom tried to control it, to quiet himself, to _NOT SOB LIKE THAT,_ it was a wonder everyone in the inn hadn't rushed in to see what all the noise was. Maybe they were distracted by the wake downstairs. As soon as Tom got his breath under control, he could hear the keening, a thin, wailing sound: eerie, unmistakable - "Beloved, why did you leave me?"

_WAIT- they had seen no wake in progress when they arrived. _Tom realized he was making this sound, too. He started to raise his hand to his mouth to make it stop, but his heart chose that instant to gather itself for a final assault against its prison: _Thud, Thud, Thud, Thud-WHAM! _He pressed both hands against his chest to keep his heart from breaking his ribs and escaping into the room. Raindrops fell on his hands. What was next, had the roof blown off the inn? He heard the roaring of the storm, and looked up at the ceiling to try to see what would have to be a gaping hole. He couldn't see, but he thought it hadn't been storming when he and Sybil arrived. He risked removing one hand from guard duty on his chest to rub his eyes. _They were wet! _Rain, or tears, poured down his cheeks and dropped off his chin-

_'The tears run suddenly from my eyes,' _he thought, _'...Will I shut the door with a weary sigh?' _A few nights before he had left Ireland to take the job at Downton Abbey, his cousins had given him a farewell dinner. When they were singing afterwards, a girl from Belfast whom he'd never seen before sang a beautiful song about a girl waiting for the boatman. He had supposed the boatman to be the singer's absent lover, but realized now that he had been wrong. The boatman was Charon, and Tom's heart, too, was _'broken and weary.' _

Relieved that he had come up with a viable plan, Tom crawled onto the bed to wait for the boatman, laying his head on the pillow where Sybil's head had lain, so that he could breathe in the lingering scent of her with his final breath.


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Note: **It's still the same night, a little later.

**Disclaimer: **I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

Tom awoke to darkness, and an urgent sense that things needed to be done. First things first: He found his coat, retrieved an paidrin beag from his pocket, and palmed the crucifix with relief. He knelt, his forearms resting where Sybil, then he himself, had slept. Tom crossed himself. "In nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti. Amen." He slid the ring onto his left thumb. "God, come to my assistance. Credo in Deum Patrem omnipotentem..."

_They had not exercised sufficient rigour in laying their plans. As a result, he was going to have to figure out what to do on his own: Sybil was not here to tell him what she wanted. Nor could she contact him: he would have to go to her. She was back at Downton by now. He had promised Lady Mary he would return the car this morning: so far, so good. _

Tom's thumb and forefinger found the first bead. "Pater noster, qui es in caelis..." _And once back at Downton, then what? He could always just drive back and see, but that kind of thinking was what had led him to be on his knees praying alone in the middle of the night at an inn, when he had hoped to be getting married. _Tom's fingers moved from bead to bead of their own accord- half his mind on praying, the other half trying to think. "Ave Maria, gratia plena..." _How had Lady Mary known where to find them? Or that they had gone at all? She might have checked on Sybil. Sybil was not normally one to miss dinner. Maybe she had been tipped off by Mr. Pratt's picking up old Lady Grantham... After all, Lady Mary had known about them already... _His left forefinger tugged gently so the next bead would slide into position. "Ave Maria, gratia plena...

_Tom considered the night Sybil had come into the garage to tell him she had 'told Mary,' but that Mary 'wouldn't give us away.' Us. Why wouldn't she? Why didn't she? Back then? What exactly had Sybil 'told' her? Sybil hadn't given Tom himself an answer until over a year later... Lady Mary could have told his lordship whatever it was Sybil had told her, and Tom would have been gone. Right then. Instantly, if not sooner. _"...ora pro nobis peccatoribus..."

_Sybil might not have wanted him sacked, but why would Lady Mary have cared? Perhaps she had thought nothing would come of it. But she had been placed on notice, so when he and Sybil both turned up missing on the same night, she came hastening after them. She and Lady Edith. Lady Mary must have enlisted Lady Edith's help as a chauffeur. _"Gloria Patri, et Filio..."

_If Tom had not taught Lady Edith to drive, the two sisters could not have come after Sybil and himself. Of course, Lady Mary could have woken Mr. Pratt to drive her. He wondered if Mr. Pratt would have agreed to drive Lady Mary without first getting his lordship's approval._ "...tua misericordia egentes." _Talk about being in need of mercy... _

Tom removed the ring from his thumb and slipped it onto his forefinger. "Pater noster, qui es in caelis..." _Why hadn't Lady Mary told his lordship what she suspected when she found Sybil was gone? That would have been the way to stop her sister from marrying him. There would be no need to talk her out of it then, his lordship would not have stood around talking as the ladies had... _"nunc et in hora mortis nostrae." _'Now' and 'the hour of our death' would doubtless have been the same moment had it been his lordship who'd burst through the door instead of his two older daughters. _"Ave Maria, gratia plena..." _Tom had a mental vision of Lord Grantham in the room with him now, grown gigantic in a battle-frenzy to rival Cuchulainn's. _"Benedictus tu in mulieribus..." _Tom might be able to face his lordship while Lord Grantham's hair stood on end like a spiky mace, but was less willing to be stared down by a giant eyeball protruding onto his lordship's face at the end of a bloody stalk. And he was quite, quite sure he did not want to find his head between his lordship's ravening jaws. _"Gloria Patri, et Filio..." _But it wasn't his lordship who came. Lady Mary and Lady Edith had come alone to stop their sister's elopement... Her elopement, but not her marriage? _Tom's breath quickened.

The ring was on his middle finger. "Pater noster..." _Tom had been thinking of their elopement and their marriage as the same thing, but of course they weren't. 'At least nothing's happened,' Mary had said. Sybil had responded that something had happened: 'I've decided to marry Tom, and your coming after me won't change that.' 'This isn't the way," Edith told them. **This **isn't the way, not there** isn't** a way._

As Tom moved the ring to his fourth finger, he thought about how he had hoped to be putting a gold ring on Lady Sybil's fourth finger this very day. Despite Lady Mary's valediction that she was 'fairly certain' she could bring Sybil around, Lady Mary had otherwise spoken as if she thought the marriage would proceed. Not as an elopement, but as a regular, announced marriage. _A regular marriage took time. The banns would need to be read. He and Sybil would need places to stay for those three weeks. Sybil wanted a job, be he would **have **to have one, they'd need somewhere to live once they were wed. _

_They needed to talk. They needed to make real plans, with contingency plans, in case things went wrong. They needed time, but there wasn't any time. As soon as they had been discovered, they had been parted. They had always known that would be true. It was why they thought they had to run off. Lady Mary seemed to think that with time her family would accept it. It was what Tom thought as well; they'd come around eventually. The Crawleys were too loving a family to cast Sybil off forever. _"...duc omnes ad caeli gloriam, praecipue tua misericordia egentes."

Tom put the ring on his little finger. "Pater noster..." _If they hadn't eloped, he would still be at Downton with her, and they could take all the time needed to plan. If they hadn't eloped. 'At least nothing's happened, thank God.' Thank God. Maybe nothing had happened. _"Salve Regina, mater misericordiae..."

_Clearly, Lady Mary and Lady Edith hadn't told their father before they came to the inn. Did they tell him when they arrived home with Sybil? If they had... he would have to cross that bridge when he came to it. But they might think there was no need to tell. They had Sybil back. If the car were back, and he were gone, there was no reason to connect that with Lady Sybil. _"Deus, cujus unigenitus per vitam." _Lady Mary was right. Nothing had happened after all. And he would wait forever, if need be. _"...et quod promittunt, as sequamur. Per e undem Christum Dominum nostrum. Amen."

It was still dark when Tom rose and put the little rosary away. It might not be daylight, but that was good. He needed time. He was still a Complete Servant: "Up, and be doing."


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's Note:** Morning has broken.

**Disclaimer:** I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

Lady Sybil awoke in the sure and certain knowledge that she had made a terrible mistake. She and Tom had intended to go to Gretna Green, get married, then return to Downton, and present their marriage as a _fait accompli_. Once they were wed, they would be man and wife, and there would be nothing Papa could do about it. Whatever might have happened then, they would have been together to figure out their plans.

Now, their marriage would need to be announced. How were they to do that? Was Tom coming back here? He would have to, he had to bring back the car. She supposed they could announce it then... and then what? Or he might bring back the car, leave it in the garage without telling anyone, then attempt to get in touch with her. Obviously, she needed to talk to Tom.

As she came more fully awake, it dawned on her that she could not talk to him, until he showed up, and at that point the crisis would be upon them.

If he were to contact Gwen at the telephone company, Gwen could get in touch with her. Would he think of doing that? She had no idea.

It was all very well for Mary to say she should take her stand and refuse to budge, but she could hardly take take a stand and announce she and Tom were getting married when she didn't even know where he was. Or how to get in touch with him.

She wondered what he was he thinking. Where would he go?

Lady Sybil went looking for her sister.

"Edith," Sybil asked, when she had found her, "you have a key to the garage, don't you?"

"Of course."

"Let's go and see if the car's back."

They went out to the garage. It was locked. Edith unlocked it, and they went inside to confirm that the Renault Landaulette was still missing. They looked around the garage, but found nothing to give a clue as to where the chauffeur might go.

Edith walked into the alcove and looked at the desk. Branson's journal and account books, which listed meticulously the business of the garage, maintenance, repairs, supplies, trips taken, trips planned, etc. were in their places, up to date as of last evening. There was nothing personal in evidence anywhere.

There were no notes except those impaled on a spindle to show that the trips being requested had been placed on the schedule. A box next to the spindle held the daily schedules in reverse chronological order. There was no trail of breadcrumbs here.

Sybil wandered in from the main part of the garage. "I don't see anything here to help us," Sybil confessed.

"Me neither," Edith said, "Let's go."

"Do you have a key to the cottage?" Sybil asked.

Edith was shocked. "I most certainly do not!"

"Sorry, darling," Sybil said. "I don't even know what I'm saying today."

Edith locked the garage, thinking it was really a pity to lose Branson: he was very efficient. He had even taken the trouble to make the schedule for today before _eloping_ last night. Edith stopped walking.

"What is it?" Sybil asked.

"He made the schedule for today," Edith said.

Edith visualized the top schedule in the box. She turned and ran back to the garage, fumbling with the key in her haste to get the door open.

Sybil followed her in bewilderment. The garage still contained only the car the girls had taken the previous night. Edith went into the office and grabbed the schedule from the box. She shoved it into Sybil's hand. "Look at that!"

Sybil looked at it. "What does it mean? Mama needed to go see Cousin Isobel this morning? So what?"

"I haven't seen Mama this morning, did you?"

Sybil shook her head, but suggested, "Maybe Pratt took her."

"No," Edith said.

"How can you be certain?" Sybil asked.

"This is Branson's schedule. He made this. He intended to drive her himself. When Pratt is going to take someone, he has a schedule of his own." Edith looked around, then found what she wanted near the door. "Here, you see? This is last night. Pratt picked up Granny for dinner and dropped her off after. This schedule is Pratt's." She dropped the paper on the desk.

"Well, since Mama isn't here, they must have gotten Lynch or Pratt to take her in a carriage."

"Without Papa raging to wake the dead wondering where the motor is? Not to speak of the _chauffeur_? Anyway, no, LOOK!" She waved the first schedule in Sybil's face again.

"I don't know what I'm supposed to be looking at, darling, what is is you see?" Sybil desperately wanted to share her sister's exitement. "What am I looking at?"

"Do you see that mark?" Edith pointed to a small mark on the lower left corner of the schedule entry."

"A check mark," Sybil said. "What does it mean?"

"It means Tom left to pick her up!"

"Tom took Mama to Crawley House this morning? Are you sure? Maybe Pratt marked Tom's schedule."

Edith was shaking her head. She picked Pratt's schedule off the desk, and showed it do her sister. "This is how Pratt marks them." Sybil looked at the mark, then compared it to the one Edith said was Tom's. They were not the same.

The two girls put the papers back in their respective boxes, locked the garage, and returned to the house to wait.


	4. Chapter 4

**Author's Note: **That same morning.

**Disclaimer: **I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

It was a little over a mile from Downton Abbey to the village. Tom himself could make the trek in about twenty minutes on foot, and had done so many times. Lord Grantham and his daughters often chose to walk to the village during the day, but Lady Grantham was not much of a walker.

Once the motor arrived at Crawley House and Lady Grantham had gone inside, Tom sat down on the running board of the car, pulled out his memorandum book, and wrote a letter to his mother. Tom explained that he had proposed to, and been accepted by, Lady Sybil Crawley, but that since he was likely to be abruptly unemployed the moment this engagement was announced, he and his fiancée deemed it best to make all necessary arrangements first. He asked for her advice.

Tom went round to the back door to let Mrs. Bird know that he was stepping around to the post office. He returned a half hour later (posting the letter had obliged him to engage in a chat with the postmistress for a decent interval), and told her he would be doing some routine maintenance on Miss Swire's car. The little car kept him occupied for the rest of the morning. At midday, Mrs. Bird stepped outside to inform him that Lady Grantham was staying to luncheon with Mrs. Crawley.

"I suppose thee'd like a bite to eat as well, Mr. Branson."

"If it's not too much trouble, Mrs. Bird," he replied, politely.

"Well, since I'd not prefer to have to change the oil in the young miss' car myself, I think it only right to keep you from starving when you do so. Mind you wash good first," she cautioned him.

Tom nodded. This was by no means the first time he had serviced Miss Swire's car, so he needed no directions where to go to wash up. He had brought pumice soap with him, since he knew from experience that if he failed to wash all the oil off his hands she would make him eat in the yard. Fortunately, he passed inspection.

The two talked while they ate: of Mr. Matthew's progress, his upcoming wedding to Miss Swire, and the likelihood of the Crawley family one day accepting Miss Swire as mistress of Downton.

Love being at the moment foremost in Tom's mind, he said, "Mrs. Bird, I always thought Mr. Matthew was in love with Lady Mary."

The older woman eyed him. "Rather impudent to be deciding such things for your betters, isn't it?" she reproved softly. Tom lowered his eyes, knowing that if he treated her with respect and bore patiently with her rebukes, she would usually tell him what he wanted to know.

"Do you think I'm wrong?" he asked quietly. "Does he love Miss Swire?"

Mrs. Bird considered. "Miss Swire is his kind. Lady Mary is above him."

"He'll be the Earl one day."

"But he isn't now, nor was he raised that way. A couple need to understand each other, as well as to love. They have to live together, and communicate, and how can they do that if words mean something different to one than to the other?"

Tom was silent, so Mrs. Bird continued, "Take thyself."

Tom looked at her in startlement. "Me?"

"Thee taught Lady Edith to drive, did thee not?"

Tom nodded.

"Suppose thee had fallen in love with her? Would thee expect to marry her? And live in the chauffeur's cottage perhaps?"

Tom just stared at her, profoundly grateful she had chosen Lady Edith for her example rather than Lady Sybil.

"No, thee'll choose a young lady sometime who'll be happy to be Mrs. Branson. Dost tha see? Love isn't always enough. A couple also need to be like."

"Yes, Mrs. Bird," Tom agreed, "I see what you mean."


	5. Chapter 5

**Author's Note: **I'm finding this story kind of difficult to write.

**Disclaimer: **I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

The waiting was the worst. The thing that made it the most terrible, in Sybil's mind, was the need to pretend that absolutely nothing had happened. She spent the afternoon doing the same nothing she had done before the war, periodically trading significant looks with her sisters.

After an interminable dinner, night at last fell.

* * *

Sybil walked across the courtyard to the garage. Light spilled out through the big doors which stood open to the night air. Sybil slipped inside. Both cars were now in the garage. She looked around. "Tom?"

"Down here, milady." He was under the car, doing something with a wrench. Tinkering eternally, as he had done throughout their 'courtship.'

"Are you hiding?"

"No, milady." Tom slid out from underneath the Renault, but didn't get up. He continued to lie flat on his back, looking up at her. Sybil saw he was not lying on the bare concrete, but on a sort of tarpaulin-like clothing protector. He didn't seem uncomfortable.

"It's 'Sybil' now, remember?"

The chauffeur smiled up at her. "No, milady, I beg to differ with you. I'm afraid it's milady again as long as we're still here." She was like a giantess towering above him, her foot only inches from his head. Sweet St. Valentine, but he was glad to see her.

"Tom, get up. I can't talk to a supine fiancé."

He laughed and didn't move. "Better supine than prone, milady."

Sybil moved her lower jaw forward slightly and growled, "Bran_son_," in a warning tone.

Branson grinned at hearing her use his surname, and rolled to the side so his head was over her black shoe. She felt his lips press firmly against her instep through her stocking for a moment, then he had risen and was standing before her.

Sybil stared at her fiancé stupidly. "You _kissed_ my foot!" she exclaimed in shock.

He feigned surprise. "You said I had permission to kiss you now, milady."

Her mouth was open in shock. "You kissed my _foot_!"

"I love your foot," he replied calmly.

Sybil's mouth was still open. He shrugged and kissed her mouth, too. Sybil understood this better, and put her arms around him, and he wrapped his around her. After taking a few minutes to greet each other properly, they both leaned back to look at each other.

"I've never seen you in this mood before, Tom."

"My darlin', I've never _been _in this mood before."

Eventually, they released each other, and Tom sat down on the workbench. Sybil stood looking down at him worriedly. "Tom, why won't you call me 'Sybil'? Are you angry with me?"

"No, but if I keep calling you 'Sybil,' I'll forget and do it in front of someone. Then his lordship will murder me. I love you, though, milady. Sit down," he invited.

Sybil perched herself next to him on the workbench. She stared at him for a long moment without speaking, then raised a hand to caress his cheek. His skin was soft. He turned his head to nuzzle her palm. Sybil sighed. "Tom, I am so sor—," she could not continue because he had laid his hand on her lips.

"No," he said.

"But—"

"I love you," he said.

"I love you, too."

* * *

"So, love, what do your novels say the lovers should do when the girl's sisters have found her and brought her back home?"

"I don't think I've ever read a book where that happened."

"I was afraid of that… we'd better make some plans of our own then."


	6. Chapter 6

**Disclaimer: **I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

If Branson had thought the ladies might avoid him after the failed elopement, he was quite wrong. Almost the first thing that happened was that he received a note from Lady Mary requesting transportation to Ripon. She suggested a time, but specified that she wanted _him _to take her, so if the time conflicted with any plans of Lord Grantham's, he was instructed to advise Anna of an alternate time, rather than assigning the trip to Mr. Pratt. Branson had a pretty good idea what Lady Mary wanted in Ripon.

The note had been dropped in the mail slot at the chauffeur's cottage; he found it when he woke. Once he had breakfasted and dressed, he went out to the garage to put it on the schedule.

Branson unlocked the garage and walked through the morning dimness to the 'office' alcove without bothering to open the big doors.

"Branson," a voice said.

The chauffeur jumped, quite literally, a foot in the air.

Lady Edith, sitting at the desk waiting for him, saw both his polished boots leave the ground at the same time. She wished she had a ruler to measure exactly the height he achieved.

He landed on both feet as well, and put a hand up to his chest. "You scared me, milady."

"You should be scared, Tom. What in God's name were you thinking?"

"'Branson.'" He corrected. "I was thinking it was time I was wed."

"You _still _want to be called 'Branson,' even now?"

"I'm still here, aren't I? What do you think will happen if you all start calling me 'Tom'?"

"Papa will kill you, and that's what you deserve."

"Really, milady?"

"Will he really kill you, do you mean, or do you really deserve it?"

"Both."

"Yes, you really deserve it, and I _really _don't want to be there when he kills you."

"I thought you wanted me to be your brother."

"I don't see what use a _dead_ brother would be… what is the plan?"

"What makes you think I've got a plan, milady? The _plan _was to elope."

"It wasn't a good plan."

"Well, you stopped it, didn't you?" They stared at each other.

"I wouldn't have gained a brother if the two of you had eloped, I would have lost a sister _and _a brother."

Tom sighed and rubbed his knuckles against his mouth. "We don't have a plan yet, Edith. We still have to make plans… help us." He was so tired already, and it was going to be such a long fight.

Edith looked at her prospective brother-in-law for a long time. She had no idea how they could possibly make it work. She _wanted_ them to succeed though. "I'll try, brother. I'll certainly try."


	7. Chapter 7

**Author's Note: ** Later that day.

**Disclaimer: ** I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

At the appointed hour, Branson picked Lady Mary up at the front of the house. Mr. Carson walked outside with her to help her into the car.

As she got into the motor, Lady Mary greeted the chauffeur. "Branson."

"Milady," he replied. "Have you decided on a destination?"

Lady Mary shot a glance at Carson before answering, "I'll direct you as we go."

'_Meaning,' _Branson thought, '_she doesn't want Mr. Carson to know. Interesting.' _

Mr. Carson shut the car door, and the two young people drove off.

* * *

Their ostensible destination was Ripon, so Branson headed in that direction. The coming interview worried him. Lady Mary had always been decent to him; she had been more than kind after he took Lady Sybil to Ripon for the count: he did not want to fight with her.

They drove in silence, which was unusual. Normally, when Branson drove Lady Mary, she encouraged him to converse, asked about the news, or politics, or even happenings in the servants' hall. Not today.

About halfway to Ripon, Lady Mary directed him to a take a turnoff. He obeyed without comment. About a mile further down the road, she said, "Do you know where we're going now, Branson?"

"Yes, milady. To Haxby."

"Correct."

Branson wondered if she realized… "Milady, you know Haxby will be full of workmen?"

Lady Mary raised an eyebrow, even though the chauffeur was facing the road and couldn't see it.

"Have you been reading gothic romances, Branson? Did you think I was going to lure you to a secluded spot and murder you for attempting to elope with my sister? How would I get back afterwards? Walk?" she waited, but he had no answer. "I know what's at Haxby," she told him.

When they arrived at the great house, Lady Mary had Branson find the head workman to let him know that they were there to make notes so Lady Mary could order decorations and furnishings. The man assured him that Sir Richard Carlisle had told him to expect her.

* * *

When the two arrived in the huge empty library, Lady Mary spoke. "I want you to leave Downton," she said.

Branson sighed. He took a moment to consider what to say. "You told Lady Sybil to take her stand and refuse to budge, milady. That isn't your advice to me, as well?"

"No, it's not."

Her answer hurt him, even though there was no reason he should have expected her to say anything different. He knew he wasn't hiding it well when he heard the plaintive tone of his reply: "Why not?"

"You're the chauffeur," she said, as if it were obvious.

"What's so terrible about being a chauffeur, milady?" He smiled, an Irishman amused to be paraphrasing George Bernard Shaw. "'How could driving you degrade me, if it does not degrade you to be driven?'"

"You know what I mean."

"Not really… and anyway, I won't be the chauffeur anymore once his lordship finds out that Sybil and I are getting married… so what are your other objections? Are you afraid I don't love her?"

"No, I know you do."

_That _surprised him. "Then why are you telling me to—"

"Branson, for your lot, being in love is reason enough to get married; for _our _lot, it isn't."

Branson wanted Sybil to be part of _his _lot. "What else do we need?"

"A position in society… an establishment…"

"This?" Branson gestured at the huge room around them.

"Yes," she agreed, happy that she'd made him understand.

"This is an empty room, Mary." The Russells had taken their books with them when they left: the ornate floor-to-ceiling shelves were empty. Was a library still a library if it contained not a single book?

"Have I given you permission to use my name, Branson?"

"No, milady."

"Then don't."

He was only surprised she hadn't told him to remember his place. He tried to think of a way to get through to her. He sent a quick prayer to the Blessed Virgin to soften the heart of her namesake. "Milady," he said carefully, "if Mr. Crawley had offered for you, even if he'd had no position except that of country solicitor, would you have refused him?" _Please let her answer truthfully, and not be offended. _

Lady Mary stared at him. She opened her mouth to tell him he was impertinent, that who she married was none of his business—but wasn't she telling _him_ who to marry, or not marry? She had not attempted to do so with Sybil. She said, "I _did _refuse Mr. Crawley when he had no position to offer me."

Branson was shocked to his core, and looked it. Lady Mary turned away from him and wandered over to the window to look at the overgrown park outside. She didn't care what he thought.

She heard his voice. "Red velvet, yes, milady, how many yards shall I put?" She turned around. Branson stood looking at her attentively, memorandum book in hand, pencil poised to note what she wanted. The head workman stood in the doorway.

The workman said, "I thought I'd let you know we've finished the drawing room and music room, milady, if you want to see those as well."

"Yes, thank you," Lady Mary told him coolly. The man left them alone again. Branson went to the door and looked out to make sure he'd really gone, then returned to where Lady Mary stood near the window.

"So position is the most important thing, milady?"

She nodded.

He hated to say this, but she had just told him the truth about herself, so—"I think Lady Sybil _is _marrying me for my position."

"What?"

"When she… accepted me, she didn't say she loved me, milady. She said she was ready to travel, and I was her ticket to get away from that house and that life. She wants to work. She wants to be with someone who is fine with her having a job."

Lady Mary looked confused. "She hasn't told you she loves you?"

"She has now," he admitted, "but she didn't before we eloped."

"Yet you still ran off with her?"

"I love her," he said simply.

"Look, Branson, even if she thinks now that it would be charming and romantic to be poor—"

"I don't think—"

"—it doesn't mean she will always want that. She won't want to be cut off from her family. Sometimes she'll want to visit her old life."

"There's no reason she can't do that unless you refuse to let her. Are you going to cut her off?"

"You know I'm not."

"Well, then." Branson hoped they were finished.

They weren't. "It isn't right, what you're doing," Lady Mary said.

"What isn't right?" the chauffeur asked. He'd missed something, apparently.

"Continuing to work for my father while hiding from him that you're engaged to his daughter… I thought Sybil said she didn't like deceit."

Branson blushed to his hairline. He looked at the floor. Lady Mary studied him attentively. Perhaps she had him.

The chauffeur stared at the bare floorboards of the barren, deserted former library for a long time. It chilled him to see the room devoid of the books that would give it life. He thought of the library at Downton, its warmth, its comfort… its master, who had given him permission to borrow books from almost the moment he had entered the house. He was indebted to Lord Grantham for all the kindness he'd shown him over the years, and to Lady Mary as well. He thought again of the message Lady Mary had sent him the night of the count in Ripon.

Branson look up at her. He swallowed, and moistened his lips, and said, "I'll go and ask his permission."

"_**What?!"**_

"You're right, it is deceitful. I'll go and ask his lordship's permission to marry Lady Sybil."

Lady Mary looked like she thought he was insane. "When?"

"We can go now."

"You and Lady Sybil?"

"You and me."

"Right now?"

"Yes."

"He won't give permission."

"I know."

"He'll make you leave Downton."

"You said that was what you wanted."

Lady Mary considered her prospective brother-in-law and his offer thoughtfully. He looked chilled and upset. Why was he making this offer? "There's no need for you to do that, you could just give notice, then you could even have a ref—" she stopped. Her face became as angry as he'd ever seen her look. "You're not offering to sacrifice yourself at all! You've made arrangements with Sybil for the two of you to leave together if Papa finds out, haven't you?"

"Yes," he confirmed.

"How dare you—"

"It would be a sacrifice, milady."

Lady Mary looked at him like she didn't believe it.

"You and Edith were right. Eloping wasn't a good idea. We weren't ready to leave, and we aren't ready now. If we left today, neither of us would have a job, and we'd have nowhere to live. I have a little money saved, and so does Sybil, but it won't last long. It would be better if we could stay at Downton while we make preparations. We'd prefer your parents didn't find out until we're ready to leave again. We know it's deceitful, we're sorry, but we couldn't think of another way. Can you?"

Lady Mary loosed a sigh. "It isn't appropriate for you to ask permission when you intend to get married whether he gives permission or not."

Branson waited.

"When you're ready to leave, you and Lady Sybil should announce your engagement… you might want to tell the whole family at the same time, if you can manage it."

Branson nodded. "Thank you, milady."

"I hope so," she said.


	8. Chapter 8

**Author's Note:** Having heard from the Crawley sisters perhaps we should check on Tom's mother's response to the letter he sent to her in chapter 4.

**Disclaimer:** I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

In Tom's family, it was normal to correspond only when one had something to say. Tom had awaited his mother's reply eagerly, and was relieved when it arrived. He was less relieved, however, after he'd opened it. It read as follows:

_A Amadán, (Have I rendered the vocative correctly?)_

_ As you may have guessed from my mode of greeting, I am in receipt of your recent letter announcing your engagement to the daughter of your employer. _

_Felicitations. _

_I freely confess to you, son, I was never able to see any earthly use in learning gaelic, but I can now clearly see that you were right, and I was wrong. For now I am left sitting here with only this one pallid, puny word at my command with which to convey to you the breadth and depth of my feelings on the subject of your coming nuptials: AMADÁN._

_You have asked for my advice. It pleases me that you do so. Naturally, as a loving and affectionate mother, I am always glad to render to my children any and all possible assistance as they endeavour to make their way(s) in the world. Accordingly, having given the matter due thought and careful consideration, as I see it you have three basic options from which to choose:_

_ The first option (and this is the choice I, as one who always has your welfare and best interests at heart, strongly recommend that you take) is to go immediately to Lord Grantham, advise him that you have been struck down by brain fever, and ask him to assist you in committing yourself to the nearest and strictest lunatic asylum available, if not to Bedlam itself. Once you have endured the Water Cure or what other 'therapies' they can devise to drive the maggots out of your fool head, return to Downton and be grateful to work for someone who is so tolerant of the 'illnesses' of his employees. Obviously, once you've been 'cured' there will be no question of a marriage, since that idea is the major manifestation of your 'disease.' _

_If the first option doesn't appeal to you (plain good sense so seldom does), your second option also has many points to recommend it: Forget this young Lady. Hand in your notice this very day, and use the reference they give you to obtain another position working for someone who has No Daughters._

_ Your third option (and knowing you, Tommy, this is undoubtedly the choice you will select) is to continue to do your job as normal while simultaneously sneaking around behind your employer's back, enjoying the smiles and encouragement of his daughter while you seek work, attempt to locate a priest willing to marry you to a Protestant, and try to find a place to live that your fian__cée _ would be willing to be caught dead in, until such time as the two of you get caught (and/or the Lady tires of you), and you get tossed out on your ear (need I really mention without notice and without a character) as you so richly deserve. Once that has happened, please come home to Dublin so I can have the gratification of saying I told you so, the satisfaction of switching your legs for you, and the edification of assisting you in writing a letter of abject apology to the Earl of Grantham for playing so scurvy a trick on one whom you have always described to me as 'a good man' and a 'decent employer.' While you're here you can take the time to make a novena to the blessed St. Telemachus in the hope that the next time you obtain a good position you won't whistle it down the wind in so idiotic a fashion.

_ Your loving,_

_ Mam _

_P.S. As far as helping you and your lady to find lodgings and employment, I'll ask around. Employment is as scarce around here at the moment as lodgings always are, but you never know what may turn up. _

_Perhaps you could be a little more specific about what you want. Are you open to living anywhere you can find work? Kiaran is in Liverpool since the end of the war, working in a repair shop, but it may be he is still too new there to help anyone else along to a place just yet._

_I'd suggest another private chauffeur job, since you've always seemed happy with that, but I'm guessing you won't have the reference you'd need, am I right? That's assuming your 'fian__cée'_ would actually be willing be married to a chauffeur, on which supposition I personally would not be willing to bet so much as a wooden nickel.

_ P.P.S. Please write again soon with an explanation of what in the name of the Merciful Mother of Our Blessed Lord you were thinking when you wrote your last. _

_Mam_


	9. Chapter 9

**Author's Note: **So how would you answer her? Tom's answer is below.

**Disclaimer: **I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

Dear Mam,

Please accept my apology in advance and know that it is only with the utmost love and respect that I make so bold as to tell you: You are in error.

You should address me _a amadáin_.

Mam, it is my earnest wish to obey you, but I'm not sure I can. I love Lady Sybil. She loves me. We are going to wed. That is what I was thinking when I wrote to you before.

I read over what I've written, and see that I have not explained anything, but how can I? I'm a chauffeur, not a poet.

Sybil is beautiful, and kind, and does whatever she can to make other people happy. She wants to be of use. She was an auxiliary nurse here during the war, and wants to continue nursing after we're wed.

There used to be a housemaid here who had the ambition (or dream) to be a secretary. She took a postal course in typing and shorthand, and bought a typewriter. The situation came to the ears of Lady Sybil, who provided a reference, and helped her look for work. It took some time (naturally) and Gwen (that was the housemaid's name) told me that at one point she had completely given up. She said she told Lady Sybil that people like us don't think our dreams are bound to come true, because they almost never do. Lady Sybil was neither angry nor discouraged, instead she told Gwen that that was why they had to stick together: that Gwen's dream was her dream now, and she would make it come true. Gwen said Lady Sybil's eyes glowed, and seeing Sybil's belief in her made Gwen believe it, too. And she did it: she made Gwen's dream come true. Gwen is now a secretary at a telephone company, a position she's held these five years.

Lady Sybil reminds me of Danny, in a way. I want to be worthy of her and do things to make her proud of me... Perhaps you'll understand.

I suppose it would be easier if I could fall in love with someone else, but it's too late for that. I think it was too late a long time ago. I tried not to love her, Mam. I did try. But now I think it's better for Sybil and me to try to make a life together, no matter how difficult it ultimately turns out to be.

Sybil has an older sister, Lady Mary, who is in love with the heir here, a cousin called Mr. Matthew Crawley. A year or so after I started here, Lady Grantham (like Sarai of old) was found to be expecting a Blessed Event. During this period, Mr. Matthew apparently offered for Lady Mary, but she refused him (she told me), because he 'had no position to offer' her, though he was/is a solicitor. Our Lord called the infant home before he could be born (may the poor little thing rest), but Mr. Matthew's restored 'prospects' did not heal the breach between the two.

Now each of them is engaged to someone else. Mr. Matthew's fiancée is a sweet, kind, and gentle lady, who deserves to marry a man who loves her, rather than one who is merely doing his duty and fulfilling pledges he only made because he was angry that the woman he loves wanted a secure position, and he disdained to try to convince her otherwise. Lady Mary's fiancé, too, surely deserves to be better than a poor second in the eyes of his own wife.

Lady Sybil and I know we love each other, so isn't it better for us to try to make a go of it? This way, if it doesn't work, at least the punishment will fall on our own heads, where it belongs, instead of destroying the happiness of completely innocent people who are only looking for love in good faith.

For if I'm sure of nothing else, I'm sure of this: I won't be happy with anyone else while Lady Sybil walks the earth.

As to more practical matters, we would like to come home to Dublin if it's possible, but if it's not, then yes, we will go wherever there is work. You are correct in thinking I will have no reference, so any type of work that requires one is out. I'll do any kind of work that will support us; I don't like deceiving Sybil's family longer than we absolutely have to, but I couldn't help noticing that you yourself listed no other option but to do so if Sybil and I are to stay together, so you have called it: I choose option three.

And if, as you predict, we are caught before our plans are complete, I will come to Dublin as you suggest, and will freely admit you were right: I promise you I will not only stand to be corrected, I'll roll up my trouser legs for you, and kiss the rod when you've done. But know that Lady Sybil with be with me, holding fast to my hand the while, for we have determined we will not be parted from each other again until the day the Good Lord sees fit to call the first of us home.

Your loving son,

Tom


	10. Chapter 10

**Author's Note: **History is passing, even as our hero and heroine become engrossed in their own affairs.

**Disclaimer: **I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

To Lord Grantham's great surprise, Branson apparently had not a single word to say about the "Message" despite having been given several openings on the trip to Malton. Really, he knew the boy had been distracted of late, but this was ridiculous.

Lord Grantham tried again on the return trip, making several provocative remarks about the Paris Peace Conference to no avail. Finally, he resorted to a direct question. "Do you think it will work, Branson?"

There was a short pause. "Milord?"

"Do you think it will work?" his lordship repeated.

"Will what work, milord?"

"No need to be coy, Branson, we're just talking between friends here. What do you think?" He'd never known the chauffeur to be shy about expressing his political opinions in the past, for pity's sake. What was wrong with the boy?

_Some_thing clearly was. "I'm sorry, milord. About what?"

"About _what_?" Lord Grantham repeated. _Was he serious? _"About the 'Message.'"

"What message, your lordship?"

"_What _message? Who are you, and what have you done with Branson?"

Branson turned in his seat to glance back at his passenger. "Milord?"

"The 'Message to the Free Nations of the World,' of course! What message, indeed." Lord Grantham shook his head in amusement.

Branson looked at the road, a little apprehensively. "I'm afraid I don't know what that is, milord."

"Are you joking?"

"No, milord."

"It was in all the newspapers."

"I haven't seen a newspaper, milord."

"_You_ haven't seen a newspaper?"

"No, milord."

His employer raised an eyebrow Branson couldn't see in disbelief. "Well, you'd better go and find one." He refused to utter another word on the subject, except to repeat, "Just go and find a newspaper."

* * *

In fact, Branson did not have to look for a newspaper. One was waiting for him inside the garage in the eager hands of Lady Sybil. She handed it to him. "Read that," was all she said.

Branson read, pausing every so often to exclaim, "Oh, my God." He read it through to himself twice, then read aloud, "Ireland…calls upon every free nation to uphold her national claim to complete independence as an Irish Republic…" he grinned at his fiancée in delight. "We are _definitely_ going home."

Edith had unlocked the garage so Sybil could wait for Branson with the good news. She eventually returned, either to see whether he had returned, or because she was bored.

"Have you heard from your mother?" Sybil was asking Tom.

Tom glanced at Edith, then said, reluctantly, "Yes, I have."

"What did she say?"

Instead of answering Sybil, Tom looked again at Edith.

"Just pretend I'm not here," Edith told him.

Tom sighed. "Why not?" He pulled the letter out of his pocket and handed it to Sybil. She read it silently, wide-eyed, then said, "Golly." She looked at Tom for permission, tilting her head towards Edith.

"You might as well go ahead," he said.

Sybil passed the letter to Edith, who started to read it, then stopped almost immediately to ask, "What does 'amadán' mean?"

"'Fool' or 'idiot.'"

Edith grinned and kept reading, laughing aloud several times. Her brow wrinkled. "What's 'switching your legs'?"

Tom looked at her sourly. "It's fun torturing me, isn't it, milady?"

Edith glanced up from the letter to look at him, amused. "It is, yes." When he didn't explain the phrase, though, her tone hardened, "I said, 'Tell me what it means,' Branson."

Six years of servitude died hard. Tom loosed a sigh. He stared at the wall. Sybil watched the two of them in fascination. Quickly, as if it were all one word, Tom said, "'Hit with a long, flexible stick." Then, "Happy now?" He was blushing.

Both girls stared at him as if they'd never heard of such a thing. Tom wished _he_ hadn't. "No one's ever switched your legs? In your whole lives?"

They shook their heads.

"Well, you're lucky. It hurts."

There was a short silence, each of the three thinking their own thoughts. Then Lady Sybil began, "She wouldn't really…?"

"No. Not now. It's just the way she talks. Mam never hits anyone once he's gotten his first job and moved out. After that she says you're an adult, and she doesn't have to be bothered, because life itself will give you your lumps."

"Who will give you your lumps?" Lady Mary's voice asked, as she walked into the garage.

"Life," Tom repeated.

"Do you mean like you're going to get when you get caught with all of us in here?"

"For heaven's sake, milady, how am I to keep any of you out?"

"Her name's Mary," Edith suggested, mischievously.

Lady Mary looked at Branson challengingly. He met her eyes, then lowered his own submissively. "I don't have permission to use Lady Mary's name," he explained to Lady Edith softly.

"Mary," Sybil objected, reprovingly.

"He shouldn't be using _any_ of our names. Anyone could walk in here. And how is he going to explain it?"

"Trust me," Branson told her, "no one just wanders in here but the three of you. Everyone else sends in their transportation requests in a timely fashion through regular channels. I don't think his lordship has set foot in this garage in the entire time I've been employed here."

"Hullo, the garage," Lord Grantham called, just before walking in. He looked at the four young people. "This is quite a powwow. I hope I'm not interrupting anything."

Branson swallowed his heart, which had leapt into his throat at his employer's sudden appearance. "Of course not, your lordship. Can I help you?"

"No, no," Lord Grantham said, airily. "It's just the old saw."

'_What,' _Branson thought, '_Speak of the devil, and the devil he doth appear?'_

Since the chauffeur didn't respond to his witticism, his lordship explained, "'When doors are open, dogs enter.'" He gestured to Isis, who was wandering around the garage, sniffing everything with interest. "Found a newspaper yet, Branson?"

"Yes, thank you, milord," Branson's smile was a little tremulous.

"And now you're planning the revolution with the help of my daughters, I suppose?" the older man teased.

"I—"

Lady Edith, in a rare burst of mercy (albeit she had her own self-interest in mind), interrupted, "We'll go on Wednesday, Branson. I see you're taking Papa to Thirsk then, so I'll take Lady Mary and Lady Sybil in the Cabriolet at 2 o'clock. Sound good?"

"Yes, milady. I'll have it ready for you."

"So that's one day at least you won't be able to spend plotting the overthrow of my 'oppressive tyranny,'" his lordship quipped.

Fortunately, Isis, having finished her inspection of the garage, completed Lady Edith's 'rescue' of the chauffeur by pulling his lordship outside in search of the stable cats.

Lady Mary looked at Tom.

"Yes, milady. You told me so. You and Mam both."

* * *

_Tom stood looking down towards the floor. Shame sat on his neck with the weight of a yoke and kept his head lowered. The cuffs of his short trousers were unbuttoned, the long stockings they normally held above his knees had fallen or been pushed down to his ankles. His shins and calves were already striped red. _

_The guilt he felt was terrible. Normally, when he did something wrong, it was through ignorance or inadvertence. Not this time. He hadn't seen any other way! He wanted to beg for mercy, but knew he deserved none. This time, he had acted in the full knowledge that what he was doing was wrong. And yet, what was it he'd done? His mind raced. He had no idea. And that wasn't right. He should know for what fault he was being 'corrected.' He didn't. _

_He saw the stick come in for the next strike. He hoped it would jog his memory about what he'd done. He felt the impact as it hit his leg, and watched a welt rise in response. An aura of wrongness pervaded his consciousness. It didn't hurt. Tom knew for a fact that a blow hard enough to raise a welt like that should hurt __**a lot**_. _His legs were a mess, he should be in agony. He __**was**__ in agony, but from guilt, not pain. Perversely, he wished it __**would **__hurt so he might feel less guilty. What had he done? _

_Tom found he could now raise his head, so he looked up at his mother to ask her, and saw that it was not Mam who was beating him. It was Lord Grantham. _

Tom woke with a start. He was sweating, and he felt as though his heart had been replaced by the telegraph straight key: it raced _short-short-short-long short-short-short-long_. Tom told himself it was just a dream, but despite himself, he threw off the bedcovers in the dim light of false dawn. He pushed up the legs of his pajamas and found his shins and calves smooth and unmarked.

As his heart slowed down, he realized that while the physical marks of the dream had been ephemeral, the overpowering shame and guilt remained with him, but there was a terrible difference. He now remembered what it was he'd done. And what he still intended to do.


	11. Chapter 11

**Author's Note: "**We do not remain in Purgatory idle. There is much work to be done even while we suffer our torments."1 … "The souls immersed in those flames suffer only from love."2

1 _"Insight into Suffering Souls,"_ Louise D'Angelo.

2 _from Notebooks, 1943, _Maria Valtorta

**Disclaimer: ** I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

Mr. Bates, returning downstairs after dressing Lord Grantham for the afternoon, found the chauffeur already seated at the long table in the servants' hall reading the newspaper. Mr. Bates informed him that Lord Grantham was in the library, but would ring when he was ready to leave. Mr. Branson nodded, and returned to anxiously conning the newspaper, in a manner reminiscent of a schoolboy cramming for an examination he was sure he was going to fail, with disastrous results.

Mr. Bates, despite the benefit of years of acquaintance with the boy in which to become familiar with Mr. Branson's subtly nuanced 'Secret Language of the Newspaper,' was yet unfamiliar with this particular mannerism, and wondered what it meant. He considered how he might ask his friend about it, but the library bell rang before the valet had formulated a remark he considered acceptable.

The bell made Mr. Branson jump, but he recovered almost immediately, and stood, grabbing his uniform jacket from the back of his chair and shrugging himself into it in a fluid movement born of long practice. He looked down at the newspaper worriedly.

Mr. Bates said, "Is something wrong, Mr. Branson?"

Mr. Branson turned to his friend and said bleakly, "Nothing we're going to be able to do anything about, Mr. Bates." And then he was gone.

* * *

Tom's next letter from Mam arrived with an ominous quickness. It was think and heavy, in an oversized envelope. He found himself taking a deep breath to steady himself before he could bear to open it. _'Please, St. Ambrose, help her to be on our side,' _he found himself thinking, almost desperately. Tom did not know what he would do if he had to fight his own mother. He loved his mother, but he was in love with Sybil. He slit the envelope. It contained a good half dozen sheets of paper and a sealed envelope.

_A Amadáin, _

_Received your 'explanation.' Very well. I concede that to remonstrate with you further would be pointless, though I find I can't resist saying that since you intend to persist in your folly, 'kissing the rod' would be an empty, and therefore pointless, gesture. (Perhaps Lord Grantham has a copy of Obedience of a Christian Man which you could borrow to refresh your recollection of the idea the phrase is supposed to convey?)_

Tom grimaced. He wished Mam weren't so right all the time.

_Please give the enclosed letter to your lady for me. Do not allow her to open it in your presence, and do not ask her what it says. If I wanted you to know that, I wouldn't have sealed it, would I? _

Did she really think he would open it? He looked at the sealed letter, address simply _Lady Sybil Crawley_. He _did _want to know what it said. Was she telling Sybil not to marry him? Would Sybil listen to her…? He put Sybil's letter down on the table, and returned to the letter he was allowed to read.

_I hope she is like Danny. God knows your cousin was the only one who ever knew how to deal with your mad starts… she'll need his kind of toughness if she wants to make her life with you. _

_I thought I'd send you a partial list now, so you can get starting writing letters… _The remaining pages contained a detailed list of the names and addresses of about a two dozen families, how he was related to them, what the households consisted of, where the employed members of these families worked, how likely they were to be willing and/or able to provide assistance to the young couple, and the kind of assistance they might be able to provide in their search for employment and lodgings. The locations ranged from San Francisco in America, to Sydney, Australia, and the types of work from acting to zoo keeping.

She closed saying she had begun negotiations with Father Cornelius on the subject of the latter's willingness to wed him to a Protestant.

_I still think this is very foolish, but you're a grown man and must do as you think best. I'll do what I can to help. _

_Love, _

_Mam_

Tom did not actually weep with relief, but he came close.

* * *

Lady Sybil walked into the garage to find Tom working at the desk in the office alcove. He rose automatically as she entered. Because they were out of the line of sight of anyone in the courtyard, they kissed in greeting.

"Don't look so apprehensive," Sybil said. "I'm here on business. Mama wants to change the time of her trip to Ripon tomorrow."

Branson nodded, and found the next day's schedule in the mass of papers. "What does she want to change it to?"

"Ten o'clock in the morning."

"That'll be all right," he said. He leaned down to mark the correction on the schedule.

"Why don't you sit?" Sybil suggested.

Branson looked at her in surprise. "Milady, I can't—"

Sybil interrupted him by leaning in with a kiss to his mouth, then pulled back again. "You can't sit while your fiancée is standing?"

Branson blinked at her.

"Tom, _sit down_," she pushed him into the chair. "I have to leave in a minute anyway. And my name is 'Sybil.'"

"Yes, Sybil," Branson replied in the same tone he would have used to call her 'milady.' He was looking down at the desk.

"What's wrong?" Sybil reached towards him, slipped a finger under his chin, and used it to gently raise his face so he was looking up towards her. He definitely looked troubled. She thought about the way she had heard Edith speak to him. She let a little steel creep into the gentle tone. "Tom, tell me what's wrong."

It took him awhile to answer. Her finger was still under his chin, and she felt some pressure from it as he started to try to lower his head again, so he would not have meet her eyes. Sybil stiffened her hand, letting him feel her silent resistance. If he didn't want to face her, he was going to have to move his head away from her hand. He stopped trying to look down, since she would not allow it.

"I wish—" there was a frog in his throat, and he paused to clear it. "I wish we could tell his lordship." Sybil removed her hand from under his chin. He moved his head as though to ease a crick in his neck.

"We will tell him, Tom," she assured him, "when it's time."

"Yes, but—"

"Tom, are we ready to leave Downton?"

"No."

"Then we can't tell him yet… what about your mother?"

"She's sent you a letter." Tom pulled it out of his pocket and handed it to her. Sybil made as if to open it, and he reached a hand to stop her. "Don't. Take it into the house. Read it in your room."

"Why?"

Tom sighed. "She says you're not to read it in my presence."

Sybil looked at him oddly. "You're mother's in Ireland, Tom, she won't know whether you've obeyed her or not."

"I'll know."

"Don't you want to know what she says?"

"Yes, I do, but _she_ doesn't want me to know, according to the letter she sent me."

Sybil smiled in amusement. "And you're tied to her apron string, even though you've been living in England and haven't seen her in six years?"

Tom pursed his lips thoughtfully. "You know what they say about that in Ireland?"

"No, what do they say?"

"A boy's best friend is his mother, and there's no spancel stronger than her apron string."

_'At least he's smiling now,' _Sybil thought.

"Besides," Tom continued. "We need her help. And if we're smart, that means we'll do as she says."

* * *

Back in her room, Sybil slit the envelope and opened the letter that was addressed to Lady Sybil Crawley.

_Dear Lady Sybil, _

_I understand from my son that you and he are engaged to be married. _

_Welcome to the family._

_While my son has explained himself to me as well as he is able, I admit to feeling some concern. Tommy's ideas about the world do not always strictly conform to reality. I fear his optimism may bring him to grief. _

_On the face of it, it seems to me very foolish for the daughter of an earl to contract an alliance with the family chauffeur. _

_I hesitate to ask this, but would you be willing to tell me why it seems a good idea to you? If you are not willing, feel free to tell me to mind my own business. _

_Your obedient, humble servant, _

_Brenna Branson _

Lady Sybil looked at the letter for a long time. How in the world could she answer?


	12. Chapter 12

**Disclaimer:** I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

Help arrived in the form of Lady Penelope Sutherdale from Helmingham in Suffolk, who shocked the social world by announcing that she had married her head gardener some two years previous, to the great surprise and dismay of her extensive and highly placed family. Like any good society scandal, it was widely reported in the newspapers.

Tom showed the article to Sybil. She sat down on the workbench to read it.

"What do you think?" Tom asked eagerly, seating himself next to her.

Sybil frowned. "A woman married her gardener. So what?"

"A _lady_ married her gardener," he corrected.

"And her family is upset. Why does it make you happy?"

"Well, it's a chance to talk about it, don't you think?"

"Talk about what, Tom?"

"Interclass marriage."

"We don't need to talk about that, Tom, we're doing it."

"Not us, his lordship."

"What?!"

"It's a good, safe way to bring up the subject with his lordship."

"You're not serious."

"I am, I-" Sybil stopped him by laying two fingers on his lips.

"No," she said firmly.

He clearly didn't agree. The soft lips under her fingers formed themselves into a frown. He pulled back a little so he could speak. "But, Sybil-"

Sybil leaned in and kissed him this time, a lingering kiss he would not want to pull away from. He was responding to her, she felt his lips open under hers, and one of his hands found and gripped one of hers.

Finally, Sybil herself pulled back to look at him. His eyes met hers, waiting.

Sybil raised an eyebrow. "Tom?"

"Yes, Sybil."

"You mustn't bring Lady Penelope up to Papa, is that clear?"

"I don't like-"

"Enough of this," Sybil cut him off. "Is it clear?"

"Yes, milady, very clear," he agreed, but she could see well enough that he didn't like it.

* * *

Lady Edith backed the Cabriolet into the garage with the precision that had always made Branson so proud of his pupil. "How is it running now, milady?"

"It started making that knocking sound again halfway back from Ripon, so you'd better keep working on it."

The chauffeur nodded. "Edith, can I ask you something?"

"Of course." Edith knew by his use of her name that his question was personal, brother to sister, rather than on business.

"I've been thinking that I should try to sound his lordship on the idea of interclass marriage, to give him time to get used to the idea before we actually spring it on him."

Edith was frowning. "How can you do that without giving yourself away?"

"There's an article in the paper about this Lady Penelope-"

"And her groom?" Edith smirked.

"Gardener."

"I saw it. I don't know if Papa did. He didn't say anything about it, and I didn't like to mention it for obvious reasons."

"I think I should mention it to him, see what he thinks."

Edith considered, then shook her head. "No, it's too dangerous. It'd be almost like telling him."

"Maybe we should tell him."

"Tom, don't be absurd. You can't tell him."

"I told my mother."

"Tom, your mother is in Ireland. If Papa were in Ireland, it might be safe to tell him, but not here."

"We have to tell him sometime," Tom pointed out.

"But not until you're ready."

Tom groaned. "I _am_ ready."

"You're not ready to_ leave_," Edith shot back. "And I'm sure Sybil's not ready. Why don't you ask her?"

Tom made a face. "I did. She said, 'no'."

"Well, then the answer is 'no,' isn't it?"

Tom sighed in defeat. "I guess so."

* * *

"Milady," Branson asked, as he drove Lady Mary back from a trip to a friend's house, "has there been any discussion upstairs about Lady Penelope?"

"Marrying the gardener?" Lady Mary laughed cuttingly. "Can you imagine me marrying Mr. Brockett? It's too ridiculous."

"As ridiculous as me marrying Lady Sybil?" he suggested.

She gave a wry half-smile, half-frown. "Yes, as ridiculous as that. There hasn't been any discussion of it. We were all afraid to mention it, lest Papa should draw any ominous parallels.

"Is that likely?" the chauffeur asked.

Lady Mary thought about it. "I'm not sure. Papa has a great capacity for not seeing anything he doesn't wish to see. Why do you ask?"

"I've been thinking about what you said, that night, about how we need to give them time to get used to it. They can't start getting used to it until we tell them."

"Tom, you can't tell them until you're ready to leave, you and Sybil."

"We don't know that."

"I do."

"Well, if I talk to him about Lady Penelope and he's very negative, then I'll know it, too." He added, almost to himself, "and maybe that will keep my conscience quiet."

"What did Sybil say?"

"She's forbidden me to bring it up to him."

"And you're thinking of disobeying her?" Lady Mary was clearly amused. "Very daring, Tom." She winked at him, then laughed.

* * *

That night after dinner, Lady Sybil excused herself from the drawing room early and went out to the garage. Tom was in the office alcove writing a letter. It reminded her she had yet to compose a reply to his mother's letter. Well, she was in no shape to write it tonight.

"Tom," she accused angrily, "why did you do it?"

"Do what?" He had risen automatically when she entered.

"Sit!" she ordered, in the same tone she would have used to Isis.

Tom sat. "Sybil, what's wrong?"

"As if you didn't know!"

"I don't know. Please tell me, love." He waited patiently for her to explain.

Lady Sybil took a few deep breaths to calm herself. "After I told you not to bring up Lady Penelope, what does Mary do but bring it up at dinner?"

Tom looked thoughtful. "What did his lordship say?"

"What did _he_ say?" Sybil was furious. "This isn't about what _he_ said: it's about what _you_ said!"

"Me?" Tom objected. "Who says I said anything? I wasn't even there."

"You put Mary up to it."

"Is that what she said?"

"No," Sybil admitted. "She just said it seemed like a safe way to sound out Papa's feelings, which is what you had said. Are you denying you spoke to her about it?"

"No, I spoke to her and Edith both."

"Why were you talking to them and not to me?"

"You wouldn't let me talk to you."

"Yes, I did. You told me you wanted to talk to Papa about it, and I said you mustn't."

"And I didn't."

"But you spoke to Edith and Mary."

"I'm not allowed to speak to them, either? Is there anyone I am allowed to speak to, _milady_?" he inquired hotly.

Sybil looked startled. She'd been so angry, she hadn't thought. She moved close to his chair. Tom wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her closer, so his brown head was snuggled against the front of her bodice. Her hands and arms covered his head and shoulders like an angel's wings.

"I didn't disobey you," he told her stomach, quietly. "I was only going to try again to convince you if your sisters agreed it was a good idea."

Sybil said nothing, just rubbed the tense shoulders under her hands comfortingly.

* * *

"Branson," Lord Grantham asked the next day in the car, "did you see the article about Lady Penelope Sutherdale?"

Branson smiled. "That she married her head gardener? Yes, milord."

"I suppose you approve?" his lordship's tone was easy and conversational, warm friendliness overlying ripples of amusement.

Branson laughed, giddy with relief to be allowed to discuss it. "Of course I do, milord. Though I doubt they require my approval or anyone else's. They're adults and free to marry as they choose."

"Rather an unequal marriage though, isn't it?" his lordship pressed.

"Why unequal?"

"She's a lady; he's a gardener."

"Many ladies enjoy gardening."

Lord Grantham laughed.

"Married couples seldom have the same occupation, milord," Branson continued. "It doesn't mean the parties aren't equal."

"I see. So you think it's fine for masters and servants to intermarry."

"Certainly, your lordship."

"So if you had fallen in love with Lady Edith when you were teaching her to drive, you would have asked me for her hand?" Lord Grantham teased.

_ 'Here we go,'_ Tom thought. "Yes, your lordship, I believe I would."

Lord Grantham raised his eyebrows. "Indeed?"

"After all," Branson pointed out, "you just said she and I would be equally matched."

_** "What?!"**_

"Lady Edith would make a wonderful chauffeur," Branson concluded happily.

"Branson, am I correct in thinking you are asking me for Lady Edith's hand?" Something that sounded suspiciously like laughter bubbled under the serious tone.

Branson glanced back before replying. Lord Grantham was grinning hugely at the 'joke.' Branson smiled back. "No, milord. I have the greatest respect for Lady Edith, and the greatest admiration for her automotive talents, but I regret to say I'm not in love with her." Mock regret tinged his servile tone. Lord Grantham shouted with laughter. "I'm sorry if I offend you, your lordship."

"Shock me, yes. Offend me, no."

"Can I ask one thing, milord. Seriously?"

"You may ask whatever you wish."

"How would you have responded if I'd said 'yes'?"

"If you said you wanted to marry one of my daughters? Seriously?"

"Yes, milord."

Lord Grantham thought for a moment. "Do you know the play _The Duchess _ _of Malfi_?"

Branson was confused by the non sequitur. "No, milord."

"It's by John Webster. There's a copy in the library. You should read it. That should give you a good idea of what my answer would be," he told the chauffeur.

Branson glanced back again to gauge his employer's reaction. His lordship was smiling broadly. Branson smiled back. "I'll do that, milord."

* * *

'How _DARE_ he?!" Lady Sybil Crawley had never been so furious. She had spent the afternoon doing the impossible: explaining to her fiancé's exacting mother why she thought it was a good idea to marry him. And what was her reward? As she crossed the hall with the letter, Papa came in. He laughed and greeted her, "Did you know Branson wants to marry your sister?"

Sybil just stared at her father, appalled.

"He says it'll be an 'equal' marriage, because they can be chauffeurs together." Lord Grantham could not stop chuckling over it.

Sybil, rooted to that one spot in the hall for a moment, continued to hear her father's laughter as he disappeared into the library. Then, galvanized by righteous anger, Sybil stormed out to the garage.

Branson had barely put the car away before his fiancée was on him. "What's this I hear about you offering for Edith?" she demanded.

Branson's eyebrow went up. "I did _not_ offer for Lady Edith."

"Papa said-"

"He was _joking_."

"And what was the joke, pray tell?" Sybil stood, arms akimbo, earrings dancing from the force of her passion.

_'God, she's beautiful angry like that,'_ Branson thought, distracted.

"Branson! What was the joke?"

Tom swallowed. "That I'd want to marry one of his daughters."

His fiancée seemed to grow larger with her fury. Tom wondered what her battle-frenzy was like. He hoped he wasn't about to find out. Meanwhile-

"Why were you talking about that?"

"Just as an example. His lordship asked me about Lady Penelope."

"_He_ asked _you_."

"Yes."

"And you told him you approve?"

"Yes."

"Tom!"

_At least he was 'Tom' again. _"Why did you leave me at the Swan Inn?" Tom asked.

"Don't change the subject."

"I'm not. Tell me why you left me, Sybil." She wasn't the only one who could get steel into a tone of voice.

She blew out a breath, and thought back to that night. "Mama and Papa would have found it hard to forgive us if we had eloped."

Tom nodded. "You said you didn't like deceit."

"I don't."

"How is what we're doing now less deceitful than eloping?"

Sybil was silent. This time she was the one to look down.

"Sybil, I know what we said about not saying anything until we're ready to leave, but it means deceiving them every day until then. And when his lordship asked me point blank if I would marry one of his daughters, was I supposed to lie?"

"Your failure to lie means we may have to leave before we have jobs or anywhere to live lined up."

"We eloped with nothing lined up; you didn't seem troubled by it then. Have you changed your mind?"

Sybil didn't answer, so Tom continued, "And suppose I had said I wouldn't marry one of his daughters, then what would I say in a few weeks when we're ready? 'Oh, by the way, what I said to you before was a bald-faced lie, wouldn't you like to welcome me to the family now?'"

The phrase 'welcome to the family' reminded her. Sybil pulled the letter she had written out of her pocket and handed it to him. "Here," she told him, "include this in your next letter to your mother." Then she stalked out of the garage.

"Sybil, wait!" he called after her, in a pleading tone. He sighed. "Don't leave me yet, love," he said, though he knew she couldn't hear him. She had ignored his call and continued to the house, where he was not allowed to follow. He looked at the sealed envelope she'd given him. Unlike his mother, who had considered one wafer sufficient to keep him out of her letter to his fiancée, Sybil had used no less than three.

* * *

During the family dinner, Tom went up to the library to borrow _The Duchess of Malfi_. He didn't know if the theatre even had a patron saint, so addressed the saint Mam always said was _his_ patron instead._ 'St. Telemachus, please let it be a comedy.'_ He found the play on the shelf and leafed through it. The Crawleys always lingered over dinner, there was plenty of time.

Something caught his eye. He stared in disbelief. His heart caught in his throat. He tried to swallow it, and nearly choked. He turned to the front of the book to read the Introduction. His heart pounded irregularly. By the time he had finished the Introduction, Tom had decided there was no need to borrow the book. Lord Grantham's 'opinion' was all too clear. White-faced, trembling, Tom replaced _The Tragedy of the Duchess of Malfi_ on the shelf and fled the library. It would have been far better to have done as Sybil had asked.


	13. Chapter 13

**Author's Note: ** Unfortunately for Tom, he has no way of knowing what this letter says. He can only include it in his own letter to Mam and hope for the best.

**Disclaimer: ** I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

Dear Mrs. Branson,

I regret I am at a loss to do as you request. As the daughter of an earl, I was never sent to school, but studied merely with a governess, whose chief concern was to teach me to speak French poorly, and to curtsey well. Now I very much fear that if I say, "_Madame, j'aime votre fils,"_ and make even my most elegant obeisance, I will have done no justice at all to your son, when he has deserved from me so much.

I was taught that it is important for a girl to make "a good match." From your question, I gather you feel an earl's daughter and a chauffeur are, by definition, _not _a good match.

But what _is _a good match?

Earls' daughters have a "season." The girl is presented at court, then her family gives a ball, and she attends balls given by others. Young men of a certain degree of wealth and social standing also attend these functions, and the idea is that the girl will 'fall in love,' with an appropriate suitor. Appropriate here is defined as "of roughly equal rank."

I had a season. I danced with many charming men. I'm sure I never thought this at the time, could not have thought it about the _chauffeur_, but at its true heart I think the problem with every one of these young men was that _he wasn't Branson. _Since his arrival at Downton, your son's behavior and opinions have been a kind of touchstone for me, a standard I have used in judging other men.

During the war I attended an auxiliary nurse training course. When Tom dropped me off there, he made me a declaration. I had had declarations from other men during my season, so I knew what it was…. I even knew by that time that he liked me _that way_, but I had tried to ignore it, and to discourage him from saying it _because I didn't want to lose him. _

Tom said he had told himself it would not work, but that the world would be different after the war, and indeed, well before the war had ended I found he was right: I found myself in the position of not wanting to return to the life of an 'earl's daughter' but just wanting the life of a regular woman, who knows what it is to work, with a regular man who loves her.

If I marry a man of my father's rank, I think this will be impossible. And is it really sensible to search the world in the hope that I may find _another _man to love and respect me, with rank and privileges to which I do not aspire, and ignore the man already at my side?

How likely is it that I will please everyone by finding an earl's son (or a duke's) with wealth and a social position, who yet thinks I'm his equal and is willing for me to work as a nurse?

I'm put in mind of Aesop's fable about the Dog and the Shadow. Having found a good man who loves me, and has the position in society I am ambitious to fill, shall I abandon the substance of a good match with your son, by seeking what would only be its shadow with a man of rank and wealth? And anyway, if I did that, Tom would no longer be with me. I don't want that. Hard nosed practicality therefore says Tom and I should be together.

Your son is my dearest friend. When I want to speak, he listens. When I want to know something, he helps me find out. When I'm sad, he cheers me. When I'm alone, he's with me.

So you see, ma'am, I should be very foolish _not _to contract an alliance with the family chauffeur, for he has been my staunchest ally all along.

Respectfully yours,

Sybil Crawley


	14. Chapter 14

**Disclaimer:** I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

Time was not healing it, whatever it was. Mr. Bates ignored his book in favor of studying his friend. Mr. Branson perused the newspaper in what appeared to be a normal manner, but which in some indefinable way was not. Mr. Bates couldn't put his finger on the difference, except that looking at Mr. Branson in the past two days, the valet kept being put in mind of the story of the Spartan youth standing at attention while the fox hidden in his tunic consumed his vitals.

No one else was in the servants' hall, so Mr. Bates said, "I'd like to help, if I can."

Mr. Branson looked over at the valet. The normal bright spark of eager friendliness had been totally extinguished, leaving only a kind of quiet penitence in its place. The boy looked both weary and sad as the soft Irish voice responded, "Thank you, Mr. Bates, but I don't know that there's anything you can help me with."

Mr. Bates felt a twinge in his bad leg, and in memory the 'limp-corrector' gripped it once again in cruel metal and leather fingers. _'Thank you, Mrs. Hughes,'_ he remembered telling the housekeeper, _'but there is nothing I need help with.'_ Mr. Branson sounded less like he was denying a need for help, then merely admitting that he didn't know if help was possible. Mrs. Hughes had made Mr. Bates tell (i.e. show) her what was wrong. Mr. Bates did not think that would work with Mr. Branson. He doubted the boy's problem partook of the physical.

When Anna at last entered the downstairs corridor, Mr. Bates rose and went to meet her. They paused outside the kitchen.

"Anna, I think something is bothering Mr. Branson."

"All God's creatures have their troubles," the head housemaid said.

Mr. Bates cocked his head, considering her words with surprise. Anna had always seemed to have a kindness for the chauffeur, it was usually she who alerted the valet, when she thought the boy needed their help, so her lack of curiosity about the chauffeur's problem(s) was striking. It was as though she had no interest in pursuing the matter, because she already knew what was wrong.

"Has he told you anything?" Mr. Bates asked, point blank.

"Not a word," Anna replied, truthfully, but then continued, "I'm sure he's fine."

Mr. Bates did not look convinced, but said only, "Have you seen him lately?"

Anna shook her head.

"Maybe you should." Mr. Bates said cryptically before returning to the servants' hall, his book, and his troubled friend.

Mrs. Patmore, having overheard, and remembering Mr. Branson's ashen face from two nights before, went into the servants' hall herself to have a look at him. _Mmm-hmm._ She returned to the kitchen without saying anything to either man, only to return a few minutes later. "Mr. Branson, would you step in here for a minute, please?"

Mr. Branson rose and went into the kitchen without even asking her what she wanted. In any event, as soon as he entered the big room, he knew: he could smell it. He looked at the cook in alarm. "I don't need that, Mrs. Patmore."

"Mr. Branson—"

"I'm not sick," he assured her.

"Mr. Branson—"

"Please—"

"Sit down, Mr. Branson." She had placed the cup on her desk and moved the chair to the side so the chauffeur would be out of her way as she worked on the removes of the dinner in progress.

"Mrs. Patmore," he tried again, "I promise, I'm not sick—"

"Mr. Branson, you are going to sit down and drink every drop of that. When you have, I'll give you a cup of tea, and you can go back to the servants' hall and read your paper. I've no time to argue with you, so do as you're told."

Mr. Branson sat. He did not want to drink the awful stuff, but he knew he was going to have to, because he could feel the eyes of Daisy and the rest of the kitchen staff on him, and despite the fact that the cook did not technically have any authority over him, if he disobeyed her in this situation, he knew it would undermine her authority with the others. He lifted the cup to his lips. The smell was overpowering. The familiar taste was bitter as gall. No wonder drinkers of absinthe diluted their libation with water poured over a sugar cube. Mrs. Patmore certainly hadn't put any sugar in _this. _Nor was it particularly dilute: it was, in fact, the strongest he'd ever tasted. It was also extremely hot; he couldn't manage to do more than sip it.

He caught Daisy's eye and grimaced, making her smile sympathetically. Branson thought about the day he had seen Daisy and Mrs. Patmore teaching Lady Sybil to bake a cake. Sybil had stood just there. Not above them. Not out of reach. Here in the kitchen, in a long, white apron, just as if she were one of the kitchen maids. He blew on his wormwood, and sipped at it, vaguely comforted, though the taste was truly vile, and he hadn't seen Lady Sybil since their quarrel two days before.

In his whole life, he had never seen a sight more wondrous than Sybil's delight as she took that cake out of the oven. _God, he missed her so much!_ Tears stung his eyes, and he knew he was in trouble, because in that busy kitchen he was not going to be able to leave the desk unobserved, nor without provoking Mrs. Patmore's wrath. He hunched over the cup and attempted to wipe away his tears with his fingers, but they just kept falling faster. He closed his overflowing eyes. _'Blessed Virgin, please give me the strength to stop crying long enough to be released from this desk.'_

He felt something pressing against his shoulder. He opened his eyes. Daisy was standing next to him. She passed him a towel, then moved quickly away. She had run half of it under the tap, so he could wipe and dry his tears in lieu of washing his face. He pressed the cold, moist cloth to his swollen eyes and flushed cheeks with relief, then dried his face, pulling himself together the while. He silently thanked the Blessed Lady for Daisy's thoughtfulness and friendship. He sighed, and combed his fingers through his hair, took a deep breath, and drained the rest of the cup. It was unbelievably bitter.

"Mrs. Patmore?" Branson asked.

"Did he finish it, Daisy?"

"Yes, Mrs. Patmore." Daisy was collecting both towel and cup.

"Then give him his tea and get him out of my kitchen."

* * *

During the servants' dinner, Mrs. Hughes, having been alerted to the chauffeur's condition by both Mr. Bates and Mrs. Patmore, watched the lad pecking at his food. She had never before known him to be ill, but she supposed it happened to everyone eventually. Certainly, it was obvious the lad wasn't himself.

When dinner was over she called him into her sitting room. Before she had a chance to say anything, he said, "I'm not sick, Mrs. Hughes."

"You just weren't hungry?"

"That's right," he agreed.

"When was the last time you _were_ hungry?"

"Two days ago," he answered without thinking, then looked like he wanted to bite his tongue for the admission.

"What happened two days ago?"

"Nothing," he whispered.

Mrs. Hughes considered him gravely. "Mr. Branson, it's not normal to have no appetite for two days; it's no shame to be ill—"

"I'm not ill, Mrs. Hughes," he insisted, "I just—"

Anna popped her head in the door. "Mrs. Hughes, why don't we ask Lady Sybil to take a look at him, what with her being a nurse and all?"

Suddenly, Mr. Branson did feel sick.

* * *

Anna's theory in making her suggestion was that Lady Sybil could pronounce Mr. Branson fit, and then everyone could leave the young man in peace. Unfortunately, things did not work out quite as she had anticipated.

Lady Sybil, accompanied by Lady Edith, entered the housekeeper's sitting room so that she could look the captive chauffeur over. For all that he had done nothing but yearn to see her for two full days, Branson now only wanted to escape. Sensing it, Mrs. Hughes had made him sit at her little tea table, and stood guard over him while they waited. In fact, she backed off only a little so he could rise respectfully when the two young ladies entered the room.

The chauffeur was flushed, and clearly uncomfortable; his quickened breathing was audible to everyone in the little room.

"I understand you're not feeling well, Branson," Lady Sybil addressed him in a professional tone.

Branson loved her voice, sweet and low, husky as if she'd been drinking sweetened whiskey punch since the day of her birth.

"I feel fine, milady," he told her. _'Now that you're here,'_ he added, silently.

"Nurse Crawley," she corrected him.

"Nurse Crawley," he repeated obligingly, his attention on the line of swirling golden suns that danced across her evening gown. "I'm not sick."

"I'll be the judge of that, Branson." She pulled off her long glove so she could lay her naked hand along the side of his flushed face in what was almost a caress. He shivered in reaction, knowing he needed to be still, that he was forbidden to respond to the feel of her bare flesh against his as he wished in this room full of people. She felt his tension and smiled very slightly. She moved her hand to his forehead assessingly.

"He's fine, isn't he, milady?" Anna finally asked.

Lady Sybil (a.k.a. Nurse Crawley) gave her patient a long look. He wondered if she knew his heart was hammering.

"No," Nurse Crawley declared. "He isn't fine at all. He's very ill. In fact, he should be in bed this very minute."

Branson looked at his fiancée in confusion. _He was not sick._ She was looking at him in a way that said she _dared_ him defy her. He had just spent two days feeling sick at heart (and been forced to drink a cup of wormwood into the bargain) as the result of his last act of defiance. He bit his lip and looked at the floor.

"Don't worry, Branson," Lady Edith told him cheerfully. "I'll drive Granny home for you, and I'll talk to Pratt about how we're going to cover your schedule for tomorrow." She smiled at the dazed chauffeur. He failed to respond in the few seconds before he was bundled out of the housekeeper's sitting room to be put to bed.

* * *

When he woke it was early morning. Sybil dozed in the bedside chair, fully costumed now for her rôle as Nurse Crawley, complete with plain gray dress, soft white attached collar with the pointy tips he'd always secretly loved, and the white wimple that made her look like one of the Sisters of Mercy, except that Sybil's was pulled back a bit to reveal waves of soft dark hair. He was sorry he'd made her angry. He hadn't meant to. He'd only wanted… He looked down at his clasped hands on the coverlet. He wished they didn't have to lie to Lord Grantham in order to be together. He sighed.

Sybil was awake and looking at him.

"You could have woken me," Tom said. "I'm not sick."

"I know," she admitted, "but you looked like you could use some sleep."

"Sybil, I'm so—" The fingers that stopped his mouth were gentle. He kissed them.

Sybil was shaking her head. "You don't have to apologize." The fingers he had kissed caressed his cheek.

"But—"

"I love you," she explained.

"I love you, too."


	15. Chapter 15

**Disclaimer: **I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

This time, when Tom woke, Lady Sybil was holding his hand. He smiled over at his nurse as she dozed in the bedside chair, brought her hand to his mouth so he could kiss it, then laid it gently in her lap. It was time for him to get up; past time, from the angle of the sun. He got his clothes and left her in the little sleeping closet of a bedroom to go wash and dress. He was half-dressed in shirt and trousers, standing in the 'kitchen' area contemplating… _something_ in a pot on the stove when Lady Edith walked in.

"Oh, never say you're getting up, Tom. Don't spoil my fun." She was wearing his cap, complete with goggles nestled securely above the visor.

"Edith, your father doesn't pay me to lie in bed all day."

"He doesn't pay you to marry his daughter either, but you intend to do that."

"That's different."

"Why?"

"It just is."

"If you say so, brother." Edith took off his cap and laid it on the little end table next to the single armchair. She came over to join him in the 'kitchen' area and stared with him at the… _something _in the pot. "What _is _that?"

"I've no idea," he admitted. "It's certainly not oatmeal, but that's all I know. It was here when I got up."

"Could it be whitewash?"

"What would anyone be whitewashing in the this cottage?"

Edith looked around. "The walls?"

"Now?"

Edith shrugged. "Don't ask me."

Tom reached out and curved his hand around the side of the pot.

"Tom!" Edith exclaimed in alarm. "You'll burn yourself!"

He glanced over at her and shook his head, finally removing his hand from the pot. "Not on this. It's barely warm. The fire's still banked." He squatted down to open the firebox, then stirred up the fire with the poker. "I guess I can see what married life is going to be like." He was smiling though as he put the poker away and closed the firebox door. "That should help it to cook a little faster… whatever it is."

"Where's Sybil?" Edith asked.

"Sleeping."

"That's what _you're _supposed to be doing."

"I've slept."

"Not enough."

"Edith, you know I'm not—"

"Sybil!" Edith called.

Tom frowned. "Thanks a lot, _sister_."

Sybil appeared in the doorway, frowning at her sister and her escaped charge both.

"Branson says he's getting up."

"Tattletale," he muttered.

"Is he?" Sybil asked, ominously.

Tom rolled his eyes. "For pity's sake, for the hundredth time, I am not sick."

"Tom, you must get back in bed," Sybil ordered.

"There's nothing wrong with me."

"You must get back in bed," she repeated, firmly.

"I have work to do."

"No, you don't," Edith reminded him. "Pratt and I are covering for you today.

The chauffeur was shaking his head. "This is insane. What good will it do to keep me cooped up in here?"

Edith piped up again. "It will do the good of allowing me to test out my chauffeuring prowess before you're gone for good."

Sybil blanched. "I wish you wouldn't put it quite like that, darling."

Her sister's words had done their job, though. Branson gathered up his discarded pajamas and went obediently back into the bedroom.

"You see?" Edith said. "It's all a question of knowing how to talk to him."

Sybil looked askance at her sister, then at the bedroom door through which her fiancé had disappeared. "I'll get the hang of it," she said. "I hope."

* * *

After a while, Sybil brought a bowl of the… _something_ into Tom's bedroom and proposed to feed it to him.

"I can feed myself," he reminded her.

Sybil handed him the bowl and spoon.

Tom looked at the white stuff in the bowl. "Sybil, forgive me for asking, but what is this?"

"It's milk porridge."

"What's it made of?"

"Milk, flour, water, and salt."

"You know I'm only sick in your head, right?"

"You know all my lessons in cookery have been geared to invalids, right?"

Tom sighed in defeat. "Yes, I know that." He looked at the white stuff again, and raised an eyebrow. "Well, I suppose I've eaten worse things." He proceeded to consume it without further comment.

When he had finished, she said, "Tom, we need to talk."

* * *

The next time he awoke, it was broad daylight, and Lady Mary was sitting in the bedside chair.

"Milady?" Branson asked, confused.

"I said I'd watch over you for a while. Sybil and Edith have gone to fetch Dr. Clarkson."

"Thank you, milady." Branson wondered if Dr. Clarkson would free him.

"Papa sent you a message."

Branson's brow creased with worry. "What kind of message?"

"He says he hopes you're feeling better soon. He says he should have known something was wrong with you."

"Why is that?"

Lady Mary smiled at the chauffeur. "I asked him that myself. He said, 'Because he hasn't borrowed a book in a fortnight.'"

Branson gave a chuff of unwilling laughter. "It's a fair point."

"Papa 'borrowed' this book on your behalf." She made as if to hand it to him, but he shied back a little.

"It's not **_The Duchess of Malfi_**, is it?" Branson asked in alarm.

Lady Mary stared at him, genuinely nonplussed. "Why on earth would Papa send that horrid play to a sick person?"

Branson laughed with relief. "No reason." He took the book from her and looked it over. It was a collection of the letters of Lord Chesterfield to his son. Branson opened the book at random, and read aloud, "_'I am very sure that any man of common understanding may, by proper culture, care, attention, and labour, make himself whatever he pleases, except a good poet.'_" He chuckled softly, "It's lucky I don't have any aspirations in regard to poetry…" He fingered the edges of the book, and looked at his prospective sister-in-law wistfully. "Please tell him thank you for me, milady." She nodded. Branson swallowed and continued, "I wish his lordship wouldn't be so nice to me. It makes me feel bad."

"Don't worry, Tom." Lady Mary advised him acerbically. "As soon as you tell him you and Sybil are getting married, I daresay he'll treat you as horribly as you could possibly wish, and then you can feel _wonderful_."

* * *

Dr. Clarkson had been afraid Branson might have come down with the Spanish Influenza, so he was relieved to find that the chauffeur presented none of the symptoms. In fact, he could find nothing wrong with the young man at all, and might have been inclined to accuse him of malingering, except that Branson insisted that he was not sick and could return to work immediately. It was Nurse Crawley and Lady Edith who reported the chauffeur's faintness and lack of appetite. Well, the lad's heart rhythm was certainly irregular, so to be on the safe side, Dr. Clarkson recommended he stay in bed for a day or two, to the chauffeur's politely concealed irritation, and the ladies' less well concealed satisfaction.

* * *

"Tom, I've been thinking."

Tom looked over at his fiancée. He was lying in bed, and Sybil was back in the bedside chair, one arm extended a bit so she could hold his hand, as she had discovered this was the surest way to convince him to lie quietly. "What have you been thinking, love?" he asked.

"You should go into politics."

Tom laughed softly. "You'd like me to stand for Parliament, eh? And when I win, do I take my seat in Westminster, or in the Dáil Éireann?"

Her brow creased. "Why, the Dáil, of course."

"Do you think I'll be able to earn much of a living that way? I have a wife to think about, you know." He smiled at her.

Lady Sybil laughed. "I have a feeling it won't be especially remunerative, but we'll get by."

Tom was still smiling as he raised her hand to his lips and kissed it.


	16. Chapter 16

**Author's Note: ** Fake illnesses make strange bedfellows.

**Disclaimer: ** I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

The day was endless.

Now that he knew Sybil wasn't angry with him, Branson felt fine, but she had forbidden him to get up anyway, and somehow the mere fact of lying in bed kept causing him to drift off to sleep for brief periods.

This time when he awoke, the watcher in the bedside chair was Thomas Barrow. The former footman, lately convalescent home manager, was ostensibly reading the newspaper he held, but noticed immediately when the chauffeur's eyes opened.

"How do you feel now, Mr. Branson?" Thomas asked quietly.

Branson blinked at him. "I feel fine. I've felt fine this entire time. I can get up."

Thomas chuckled softly and shook his head. "I couldn't advise it, not until Nurse Crawley says you can. She's a terrible woman in a temper."

Branson smiled ruefully. "Don't I know it."

"Would you like to hear what's in the paper?" Thomas asked.

"Yes, please." Branson looked out the tiny window at an impossibly blue sky while Thomas relayed the day's news.

Thomas, for his part, was grateful to be out of the servants' hall and out from under Mr. Carson's eye for the afternoon. Thomas had always gotten along well enough with Mr. Branson, perhaps because encounters between the two men had consisted primarily of Barrow telling Branson that various individuals were ready to leave or wanted the car, followed by Branson's immediate obedience to the commands Barrow was relaying, though Thomas would have allowed, if asked, that it was helped along by the fact that Mr. Branson, despite being technically higher in the servants' hierarchy than Thomas, never sat above him at table in the servants' hall, and had always treated the footman with a kind of respectful friendliness. It was a situation naturally productive of harmonious relations.

Thomas wondered for the hundredth time what he was going to do now that his "black market" business had failed. He envied Mr. Branson his secure position, and even more, his contentment with it. He snuck a glace at the chauffeur between sentences. Where did that contentment come from? Why could he himself not have been content being a footman?

Still looking out the window, the oblivious chauffeur drew a deep breath and let out a sigh that seemed to carry the weight of the world. _'Hear, hear,'_ Thomas thought.

When Nurse Crawley returned to the "sickroom" it was to find the two men laughing over the 'Situations Vacant' column.

"'Manufactory Superintendent,'" Thomas read, "'Must be able to handle young girls.'"

For a startled moment, Sybil thought Branson had taken Thomas into his confidence about their own plans and enlisted him to help in the hunt for a job, but then Branson said, "'Do you think you could handle a factory full of young girls, Thomas?'" and Sybil breathed a sigh of relief.

"I don't know about that, Mr. Branson."

"What's the next one?"

Sybil walked in, interrupting their job search. "How's our patient, Thomas?"

"I'm fine, milady," Branson told her. "I've been fine this whole time."

The lady cocked her head and said mildly, "Have I spoken to you, Branson?"

The chauffeur blushed. _'Who was she, Edith?' _"No, milady."

"Nurse Crawley," she reminded him.

"Nurse Crawley," he repeated, abashed.

Thomas was fascinated. He'd never known Nurse Crawley to be such a stickler before, especially with a patient. He looked at the chauffeur speculatively.

Lady Sybil turned back to the former footman/house manager. "Corporal Barrow?" she asked.

"He's been fine, Nurse Crawley," Thomas agreed. "He listened attentively to what was in the paper."

"Has he tried to get up?"

Thomas looked over at the chauffeur, who was looking out the window again, but was still blushing. "No, he hasn't."

"Just said he could?"

Thomas shot a glance at the chauffeur, and temporized, "It's perfectly natural that—"

"So he did say it?"

"Yes, but when I told him you wouldn't like it, he didn't try it."

Nurse Crawley nodded, looking thoughtfully at the chauffeur, who continued to stare out the window. "Do you think you could swallow some tea, Branson?" she asked mildly.

He finally turned to her, his expression wonderfully submissive, she thought, considering he must be going out of his mind with frustration. "Yes, please," he said.

"I'll make us all some," she offered, and left the bedroom.

Thomas watched her walk into the kitchen area, then looked back at the now quiet and resigned looking chauffeur. Something odd was going on, Thomas was sure of it.

"Will you go on reading?" Mr. Branson asked.

Thomas, distracted, looked back at the paper for the next situation being advertised.

By way of "coddling" the chauffeur, and in the hopes of enticing his still presumably flagging appetite, Mrs. Patmore made a Dublin coddle and sent Daisy over to the chauffeur's cottage with it that evening. It still lacked a half hour until they would ring the dressing gong, and Lady Edith had replaced Thomas as Branson's minder, so she could bring him up-to-date on the day's work in the garage.

It was therefore Lady Edith who answered the door.

Daisy looked surprised to see her, but said only, "Mrs. Patmore sent this for Mr. Branson."

Lady Edith thought it smelled wonderfully, but forced her face into a sad and worried frown. "Oh, I don't know if Branson will be able to eat that."

Daisy thought that if that were true it would be a first, since he normally couldn't get enough of it, and in confirmation, the chauffeur's voice came strongly from the bedroom. "If that's what I think it is, I most definitely can _and will_, milady!"

Daisy laughed, a little afraid of his talking so freely to Lady Edith, but not much, since Lady Edith had been nice to her. Daisy smiled at Lady Edith shyly. "It sounds like he's much better, milady."

"I am, Daisy. Tell Mrs. Patmore thank you," Mr. Branson called. "I'll thank her myself tomorrow."

"I'll see you tomorrow then, Mr. Branson," Daisy called back. "I'd better get back, milady. Mrs. Patmore will wonder where I am."

"Thank you, Daisy," Lady Edith said, showing her out. After she had closed the door, she walked back to the bedroom. "So you think you're getting up tomorrow do you?"

"I know I am," Branson told her grimly.

"Will see what Sybil has to say about that."

"She'll say I can get up."

"We'll see," Edith told him.

* * *

Sybil herself didn't return until after the family dinner. She was again in nurse's uniform. No one was watching him, but she saw he was lying obediently in bed anyway, despite his reported pronouncement to Lady Edith.

"I hear you're getting up tomorrow, Tom."

He looked up at her calmly. "That's right."

"What if I say you can't?"

"You won't say that," he told her.

She stood looking down at him, and he lay looking up at her for a long time. Finally, he looked away.

"Sybil?"

"Tom."

"What was all this for?" He was looking back up at her again.

Sybil smiled. "I just wanted you 'fast in my fortress' for a while.

His brow furrowed. "What does that mean?"

"Not a fan of Longfellow, are you?"

"Longfellow?" he asked.

"As in 'Henry Wadsworth.'"

Tom shook his head.

Sybil sat down next to him on the bed, so they were both facing the same way, and slipped her right arm around his shoulders. He turned to look at her quizzically, and she leaned her forehead against his, her white starched wimple rough against his brow, and recited, in singsong voice:

"I have you fast in my fortress,  
And will not let you depart,  
But put you down into the dungeon  
In the round-tower of my heart.

And there will I keep you forever,  
Yes, forever and a day,  
Till the walls shall crumble to ruin,  
And moulder in dust away!"


	17. Chapter 17

**Author's Note: ** The next day.

**Disclaimer: ** I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

Despite the talk at dinner the previous evening, when Miss Lavinia Swire pulled her little two-seater Maxwell AB up to the garage at Downton Abbey late that morning, the big doors were open, and Branson was inside. He had been sitting on the workbench looking at something he had inside a wooden box and making notes on a clipboard, but when he heard her car, he put down what he was doing and came outside to greet her.

"Good morning, Miss Swire. It's a beautiful day."

"Beautiful," she agreed, "but cold."

"Well," he pointed out, "it's the cold days now that'll make us appreciate the summer when it comes."

"Then I think we're set to appreciate this summer a great deal," she laughed.

Branson had turned his attention to her car, which was splashed liberally with dried mud. "Maxwell certainly needs a bath. Where's he been?" The chauffeur ran an incredulous finger through the dirt on the car, then looked at his filthy digit like he'd never seen such a thing before.

"Mr. Crawley and I got lost," she admitted. "We weren't actually on the road the whole time."

"I'll take care of it for you," Branson offered. "Will you be at the house for a while?"

"We're staying for luncheon," she told him, "but you don't need to, they said last night you were ill."

"I'm fine, miss, it's no trouble."

"Really," Miss Swire insisted, "I only came back here to see how you were doing, not to bring you extra work."

The chauffeur was amused. "Miss Swire, with respect, if you didn't want me to take care of it for you, you'd have parked out front, not driven it all the way back here, isn't that so?"

Miss Swire gave him what was really a very engaging up-from-under shy smile of acknowledgement. Branson laughed. "Please let me take care of it for you, miss. I _want_ to. It hurts my professional pride to have Mr. Crawley's fiancée having to drive around in such a condition. We have to uphold the honor of Downton, don't we?" he begged, teasingly.

Miss Swire found it wonderful the way the servants at Downton made it seem like you were doing them a favor by allowing them to serve you. It wasn't like that at home. "Very well," she agreed. "If you're sure you're all right."

"I'm fine, miss," he assured her. "I think they just missed the convalescents so much they decided to make me into one."

Miss Swire chuckled. "You don't seem especially ill, I have to admit."

"I'm not, miss. I'll have the car up front for you after luncheon, shining like a new penny," he promised.

"Thank you, Branson."

"It's my pleasure," he told her. Branson watched her walk up to the house, troubled at heart. Surely such a sweet lady deserved to be happy. He sincerely hoped he was wrong about Mr. Matthew. But then what about Lady Mary? Clearly, no matter what happened, someone was doomed to be hurt. Branson sighed. He wished there was some way he could help, but all he could think to do for Miss Swire was to take care of her car.

* * *

Brenna Branson watched her niece approach the desk. The girl handed her a stack of letters. Brenna raised an eyebrow. "So that's the way you intend to do that, is it?"

"Yes, ma'am." The girl started to walk away, then turned back. "Auntie… is there some other way I _should _do it?"

Brenna smiled at her suggestively. "Wasn't a salver supposed to be involved?"

"Oh," her niece gasped, "I clean forgot." She snatched back the letters, causing her aunt to snort with amusement, then ran out of the room with them. A few minutes later, the girl returned, this time with the letters placed on a tiny tray. She presented it to the older woman, with the words, "First post, ma'am," uttered in sepulchral tones.

"Much better," Brenna praised her. She took her letters off the tray. The girl went back to her dusting, leaving her aunt to look at the post, but after a while she asked, curiously, "Is one of those from Tommy?"

"One is," Brenna agreed.

"Do you think he'll ever come home?" the girl asked, a little wistfully.

"Would you like him to?"

"He was always nice to me," she said.

"How old were you when he left?"

"Nine."

"He says he wants to come home. He's getting married, and wants to bring the girl here."

"Donal will be glad."

"Do you think so? It's an English girl he's bringing."

"He'll be glad. It'll be almost like having Danny back, a bit."

"Tommy's not much like Danny was."

"But they were together so much, d'ya'see?"

Brenna nodded, thinking about her son, and her nephew now deceased.

"You think Donal would be willing to put Tommy up for a few weeks?" At her niece's quizzical look, she continued, "he'll need somewhere to stay before the wedding."

The girl thought about it. "Maybe."

"Think Donal can find him a job? He'll need that, too."

The girl laughed. "And you want him to have one of Donal's finding? Well, maybe he can, at that? Does Tommy still dance?"

Brenna expelled a breath that was half laugh, half sigh. "I don't know if he has been, but if not, my guess is he'll soon need to start."

* * *

The screen slid open.

"Salve, filius meus," the priest greeted him.

"Salve, Pater," the penitent responded, then crossed himself as the priest intoned, "In nomine Patris, et Filii et Spiritus Sancti. Amen."

"Bless me, Father, for I have sinned," a soft Irish voice advised the priest. "It is four weeks since my last confession. And these are my sins…

Father Mark had been listening to this boy's confessions since he had first been sent to Ripon two years before, but he had _never _heard a confession like this one. The boy was _out of his mind_. Father Marked rubbed his forehead behind the grille, but waited for the Irishman to finish his recital. Finally, he heard, "For these and all the sins of my past life, I ask pardon of God, penance, and absolution from you, Father."

There was a long silence. Father Mark knew what he was supposed to say, but found he couldn't say it. He shook his head, but he knew it was a wasted gesture, since the boy couldn't see it. He needed to know more than this, and he needed… he sighed, "That's Tom Branson, isn't it?" he asked.

There was a long pause. The church was _very _quiet, Father Mark noticed. Into that profound stillness, very softly, came the reply, "It is, Father."

Father Mark considered. He was doubtless going to find himself confessing _this _to someone down the line, he supposed. But wasn't he supposed to be helping people? What was more important, the people or the rules? _The people._

"Come out of there, Tom."

Father Mark heard the door of the penitent's side of the confessional box open. The priest was grateful for the immediate obedience that saved him having to answer awkward questions.

He opened his own side of the confessional and met the boy outside. "Come with me," he said. He headed out of the empty sanctuary, followed by the silent chauffeur. They walked down a hall and went into a little back room kitted out with a small table, a little spirit stove, and tea things. The priest indicated with a gesture that Tom should sit, but said nothing else until he had set a cup of tea before his guest and sat down next to him with a cup of his own. The chauffeur likewise said nothing, merely did as he was bid, accepting the unusual situation without question.

Father Mark blew on his tea. "I don't know that I can grant you absolution, Tom."

Tom sighed, but still said nothing. He picked up his cup and sipped at his tea, then snuck a glance at the priest. Waiting.

Seeing it, Father Mark continued, "For one thing, you clearly aren't repenting it: you're still doing it."

Tom looked down momentarily, then made himself look back up at the priest again.

"And for another thing," Father Mark admitted, "I'm not convinced it's actually a sin."

Tom's brow furrowed. "I'm lying to my employer every day. How is that not a sin?"

"What have you said to Lord Grantham?"

"Nothing."

"So what's the lie?"

Tom ran his teeth over his lower lip. He sighed. "I _should _be saying something to him."

"Why?"

Tom had set down his teacup. Now he put his elbows on the table and rested his aching head in his hands. He rubbed his forehead roughly. "Help me, Father. Just help me."

"I'm _trying _to help you," the priest told him. "Look, Tom, I understand you feel guilty, but you should think about what you're doing here."

"I've thought about nothing else since it happened."

The priest shook his head. "That's not what I mean. I don't mean you should think about your wedding plans, that's neither here nor there. I want you to literally think about what you are doing **here**, or rather, what you wanted to do in _there_." He motioned with his head back towards the sanctuary and the confessional.

Tom had raised his head from his hands so he could look at the priest. He lowered his hands to his lap.

"You say you're seeking absolution from God, but it's not God's disapproval you're worried about, but Lord Grantham's."

Tom said nothing, but the priest saw the truth of his guess on Tom's face.

Very gently, Father Mark said, "I don't have the authority to grant you absolution from Lord Grantham."

Tom looked down at the table. There was still tea in his cup, so he picked it up and drank some of it, then set it down again. He took in a deep breath, and let it out, then looked back at Father Mark.

"Perhaps," the priest suggested, "you should worry less about being honest with his lordship, and more about being honest with yourself."

Tom waited.

"You plan to marry Lord Grantham's daughter."

Tom nodded, expelling a breath. "That's what I'm planning."

"You think he'll dismiss you when you tell him so?"

"I think so, Father."

"You've decided to wait until you've found a job before you tell him."

"I have."

"Do you think he would be angrier if you announce your engagement before you have a job?"

"I do."

"And that's why you're waiting to tell him?"

"It is."

"On the other hand, you think the longer you go without telling him, the angrier he'll be."

Tom sighed. He was now looking at the wall. "I do think that, yes, Father."

"Well," the priest concluded happily. "There's only one thing you can do."

He had the boy's full attention anyway. He watched Tom moisten his lips. "What's that, Father?"

"Give the girl up."

"No!"

"It's the only way you're going to keep her father from being angry, isn't that true?"

"Yes, but—"

"So you _do _think the girl is more important?"

"I do."

"But you feel Lord Grantham will have every right to be angry, no matter when you eventually tell him, because you're sneaking around behind his back, and you're his servant, even if you _weren't _sneaking around, so you'll be betraying his trust by marrying his daughter."

_"Yes," _Tom breathed.

"Yes, _what_?" Father Mark asked.

Tom took a deep breath, then said it. Loud. "Yes, I'll be betraying him, and he'll be right to be angry."

Father Mark looked into the blue eyes, transfixed by so much hurt, so much regret. It hadn't even happened yet… and Father Mark knew there would be no way to make it go away. This boy was a chauffeur, and if he married his employer's daughter, there would be a price to pay.

"Tom?"

"Yes, Father?"

"You're not betraying him by loving his daughter."

The blue eyes met the brown eyes of the priest. The priest saw the need that was still there, so he said, "I think you're right: he_ is_ going to be angry."

"Yes, Father, he is."

"For as long as he is angry, you are going to have to accept his anger, and endure it. You will have to bear with him with as good a grace as you can muster, for as long as it takes for his anger to cool, even if it takes your whole life long… even if it _never _cools... and _that _will be your penance."

Father Mark looked at the chauffeur, watched the tears run down his cheeks unheeded, and waited for the boy to take in what he'd said. Tom sighed, and nodded, and the blue eyes that met his were at peace. "Thank you, Father."

Father Mark, grateful to have met the boy's need, took the chauffeur's hands in his own, and said huskily, "Now make me a good Act of Contrition."

Tom drew a deep breath. "Deus meus, ex todo peonitent…"

When the chauffeur had done, the priest responded, "Dominus noster Jesus Christus te absolvat…"


	18. Chapter 18

**Disclaimer: ** I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

Brenna Branson was finding, somewhat to her surprise, that during the years her son Tom had been successfully placed across the water, she had more or less lost the habit of thinking about him. He was her son, she loved him, but he hadn't needed anything, and hadn't been bringing himself to her attention, so she thought about the things and people who did. Now, perusing his most recent missive, she found herself a little unsure what to make of him.

His letter addressed the issue of his wedding plans, his now definite desire to return to Dublin as opposed to going anywhere else, his proposed living arrangements (or his desires on that subject along with his suppositions about the desires of his fiancée), and the status of his enquiries into possible work situations, but the bulk of this particular letter contained his analysis of the current status of the Paris Peace Conference, his irritation at the British government's blocking not only of recognition of the Irish delegation, but of a Persian delegation as well, his thoughts on the military activities of the Bolshevik army in Russia, a comparison of Ireland's newly declared independence with the aspirations of the Catalonian Union Conference in its quest for "Home Rule" from Spain (with a digression into whether it might ultimately develop a desire for full-blown independence as Ireland's had), and his guess as to what the "first draft" (as he termed it) of the League of Nations Covenant might contain.

Brenna's opinions on politics were entirely pragmatic, so the content of his opinions on Irish and/or world affairs were less important to her than the fact that he _had _opinions on such matters… he had always talked about such things, of course, but she thought this might be the first time she had seen his opinions written down like this. Perhaps there _were _jobs he was suited for that had nothing to do with motorcars after all.

Just as this thought had completed itself in her mind, the doorbell rang. She went to answer it.

"Donal," she greeted her nephew in surprise.

"Aunt Brenna." He was equally surprised. "I thought you had Dara answering your door these days."

"Hmm," she sniffed. "She's doing the marketing."

"Still?"

His aunt gave him a look. "Doubtless she stopped to 'pass the time of day' with someone… or several someones. You wouldn't want her to be rude, would you? She'll get back eventually. She's still new at the task."

"Very understanding of you," he commended her.

"She'll learn." Brenna had brought him back to the kitchen. "Would you like something, Donal?"

"I can't stay long."

"A cup of tea in your hand?" she offered. He nodded, so she set to making it. "What brings you here, Donal?"

"Dara said Tom might be coming home."

"And you'd like to speed the day?" she smiled at her nephew.

"Maybe. If I can."

His aunt considered him, one corner of her mouth tucked up, not in a smile, but in an expression of consideration typical of her. Her tongue touched her upper lip briefly, as if this somehow aided her thought processes. "Let me show you something." She disappeared in the direction of the parlor for a moment, then was back with Tom's letter. "Read that."

Donal read it, then read it again. He looked up at his aunt. "It's like Danny never died."

Brenna snorted. "As if Danny cared about Catalonia. I doubt he knew where Catalonia was. To Danny there was no country but Ireland."

Donal was looking at the letter. "Not that, but…"

"I know," Brenna admitted. "What do you think?"

He sighed. "Maybe….but it could be dangerous, and Tommy is….not always on his guard."

Brenna snorted. "He's a fool, you mean. Marrying an earl's daughter, no less."

"You've been known to marry someone not-quite-suitable for love, Auntie."

Brenna gave her little half-smile again. "You're saying he comes by it honestly?"

Her nephew shrugged. "No one could talk _you _out of marrying Robert Branson, now could they?"

She sighed. "I'd marry him again today if I could. He was a wonderful, _wonderful_ man." She looked at her nephew. "So will you help his son?"

"Are you sure it's what you want, Auntie?"

"I'm sure. He has to do something, doesn't he?"

Donal was still looking at her dubiously.

"_Living _is dangerous, Donal. We all end up in the grave at the end. We'll tell him to be careful."

Donal nodded. "Can I borrow this letter?"

Brenna nodded.

"I'll see what I can do."

* * *

The first thing Robert noticed when he stepped into the library before breakfast that morning was that the bookcase-fronted "hidden" servants' door was open. At this hour, it could only be one person. Accordingly, Robert looked over to the shelf where he kept books on political topics. Branson stood before it, leafing through a book he held, brow furrowed in concentration.

Robert stood at gaze a moment to watch him, like someone watching a bird or a deer in a field, knowing that if he moved or spoke the boy would be startled into flight.

He had been so right about Branson: from that very first day, when the chauffeur had admired the library, Robert had _known. _What was the quote? Something about there being no greater bond than that between people who love the same books? Robert had never seen anyone take such pleasure in the library as this Irish boy did. It was a joy to Robert to watch him, for all that he was hopelessly naïve, and his politics were almost diametrically opposed to Robert's own. The young Irishman had an inquisitive mind, and a gift for conversation; it was a pleasure to talk to him…. Robert was never lonely when being driven somewhere by Branson.

Branson was looking at him. The chauffeur had come to an unfamiliar word, and turning to go to where the big dictionary stood, found himself facing his employer. He swallowed. "Milord. I'm sorry, I thought you'd be—"

"Having breakfast," Robert finished for him. The boy nodded. "And so I should be."

"I'll go—" The boy had already re-shelved the book.

"Stay." The chauffeur turned back to him. "Were you going to borrow that book?" Robert asked.

The chauffeur looked back over his shoulder at the book, where it rested on the shelf. He bit his lip. "Yes, milord."

"Then go ahead and take it now."

The boy swallowed again, then retrieved the book from the shelf.

"Have you recovered from your illness?"

"Yes, thank you, milord." He looked down at the book he held, and ran his finger along the corner of the front cover.

"You're sure?" Robert asked. The boy didn't seem quite right, somehow.

"I'm sure, milord." He looked up at his employer. "I wanted to say thank you, milord, for… sending the book, and for…

Robert was nodding, waiting tolerantly to hear what else he was being thanked for. The boy was remarkably grateful today, Robert thought in amusement.

"… for letting me borrow books. I don't think I've ever told you… how much it means to me." Robert raised his eyebrows at this, but Branson was looking down at his book again. "You've always been… " Branson struggled for a way to express the rest of his thought, but when the phrase _'a good master' _popped into his mind, he stopped in confusion. He finally substituted, awkwardly," …very kind, milord."

Robert stared at the boy. He _knew _the chauffeur had been going to say something else. _What _had he been thinking, that he had decided not to say? Circumspection was not normally the chauffeur's strong suit. The boy was blushing, painfully. Something about being given the day off due to his illness, probably, and it embarrassed him. "Of course," Robert said, soothingly.

"I should go, milord." Branson said.

"And so should I. Carson will be wondering where I am." Robert left to go in to breakfast, leaving Branson to sign his book out at the ledger.

* * *

"Mrs. Stewart," Lady Sybil asked, "what would I need to run my own household?"

The old woman looked up from her tea, and stared at her young guest in surprise. "You'd know better nor me, my lady," she said.

"Not a grand household, I mean. But say a young girl, and her husband. What would they need?"

The elderly woman considered. "Is it for one of your charities you need to know, my lady?"

"Yes, that's it," Lady Sybil agreed, smiling. "For one of my charities."

"Well," the old lady sipped her tea thoughtfully, "the first thing you need to think of is…"


	19. Chapter 19

**Disclaimer: ** I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

To Lady Mary Crawley's great relief, things had at last returned to normal. When she went to the garage to arrange for transportation, she no longer found Sybil or Edith there, but only Branson, very busy working. The chauffeur once again made arrangements to take her to the village, or to Haxby Park, or to Ripon, or wherever, just as though he had never taken her sister and the Renault and stayed half the night at an inn in the upper reaches of North Yorkshire with a view to imminent matrimony. He made no personal remarks, and spoke only of his business.

Thinking about what Papa had said about Branson's borrowing of books, Lady Mary went to the library and checked the ledger to find the chauffeur had resumed his borrowing of political tomes. In the car, he resumed talking to her of news and politics, rather than anything personal. She began tentatively to hope that he had given up… though in truth he seemed less resigned than oblivious, as though the interlude of his erstwhile romance had never happened, _not _as though it had ended.

Lady Sybil was occupying herself during these winter days chiefly at Crawley House. She and Cousin Isobel, in conjunction with Dr. Clarkson, had worked out a physical therapy program and were using massage techniques and exercise to help Cousin Matthew perfect his recovery of the use of his legs.

Miss Lavinia Swire was also present at Crawley House nearly constantly, except for occasional trips to York or to London for the purpose of purchasing finery for use either during her upcoming wedding to Cousin Matthew or for their life together afterwards. Lady Edith had attached herself to the London girl, bonded apparently by their driving, and had ceased all speculation (at least in Mary's presence) of how Sybil and "Tom" were ever going to bring their plans to fruition. Now whenever Edith mentioned the chauffeur (which she actually did a lot in connection with Miss Swire and the girls' use of either Miss Swire's car or the Cabriolet) she once again called him "Branson."

So Mary had been right to say nothing to Mama and Papa about Sybil's elopement. Nothing had happened, and it was looking like nothing ever would happen. Lady Mary was happy it was all working itself out… wasn't she?

* * *

Ever since he had begun his search for work, Branson had been getting a lot of mail. Today he had received no less than two letters and a package. In keeping with the Ryan/Branson family's tradition for the opening of Christmas presents, he opened the smaller of the two envelopes first:

_Dear Tom, _

_Have you ever thought of trying to get a job on a newspaper? _

As what? Tom thought.

_I've been thinking since reading your most recent letter that you'd make a fine reporter. _

Tom thought this was probably the most flattering thing his mother had ever said to him. He himself had _not _thought of such a thing, no. It was one thing to write a letter to _Autocar_ about car repairs, or even to _The Times_ or to the _Yorkshire Observer _explaining why Ireland should be recognized as a nation separate from Great Britain, and something else again to attempt to be Hamilton Fyfe or Philip Gibbs. He couldn't help but smile at the idea though. _'Thank you, Mam. I had no idea you thought so highly of me.'_

The larger envelope was from his cousin Donal O'Neill. He fingered this envelope a moment before slitting it open. Donal was Danny's older brother. Tom's jaw clenched for a moment, fighting off the pain thoughts of Danny still brought him. Why couldn't he think about the good times? Why was the loss of Danny still so fresh to him? It was nearly three years his cousin was gone, and three more before that since they'd last seen each other… he shoved what he knew was guilt at the thought that he'd disappointed Danny out of his mind, and opened Donal's letter.

It was more about this newspaper idea of Mam's. Tom shook his head, smiling. Why would a newspaper hire a chauffeur? Did they need a mechanic? How on earth could he convince anyone to give him a chance as a journalist? How could he _do_ the job if he _did _succeed in convincing someone? And Mam thought _he _was a naïve fool. Tom guessed the apple didn't fall far from the tree.

Donal's letter also contained a second letter apparently written by Donal and Danny's brother David.

_"A Thomáis," _it read, _"Ba chóir duit a bheith ina iriseoir…"_

Tom wondered if the water in Dublin had become tainted. His gaeilge was not good enough to read all of what David had written, but he gathered that David was in on this mad idea about Tom's chances of joining the fourth estate. Tom's entire family was apparently through the looking glass, in a world filled with bizarrely staffed newspapers. They had lost their minds. The strain of helping him find work had been too much for them, poor things.

Tom put the mostly incomprehensible letter aside and opened the package. It contained an 1894 printing of the Rev. Eugene O'Growney's book _Simple Lessons in Irish_.


	20. Chapter 20

**Disclaimer: ** I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

Mam appointed herself Sybil's surrogate 'family' in Dublin, so Sybil would stay with her before the wedding, and Tom would stay with the O'Neills, whom Cousin Donal had agreed would act as the 'family' of the groom. After the wedding, Tom and Sybil would stay with Mam until they found permanent lodgings, as Mam considered it ridiculous to pay good money for a place they couldn't actually use until after they were wed.

Father Cornelius wanted to meet with them when they arrived, but according to Mam he had already agreed to conduct the ceremony, provided Sybil agreed that their children would be raised Roman Catholic. This stipulation had made Tom nervous, but when he broached the matter to Sybil, she agreed readily without asking any questions. Having obtained her agreement, Tom saw no point in discussing it further. They were therefore ready to leave as soon as Tom had a job.

* * *

_'It will be a war of public opinion, a war of words, not one of bullets and mustard gas,' _the letter ran, _'so the proper weapons are logic, newsprint, and word of mouth, rather than machine guns, battleships, and bombs.' _Tom hoped Mr. Weiss was right, since the likelihood of Ireland's fielding an army capable of defeating the assembled forces of the British Empire was dubious, to say the least, no matter how may Irishmen the British Army boasted in its ranks, even if they all deserted to fight for their own country, which it was by no means certain that they would do. Natan Weiss' letter had arrived enclosed in the most recent letter from Tom's cousin David, and seemed to be merely an invitation to correspond, rather than anything more practical. David had passed the letter along by way of 'introducing' the two men, after having shown Tom's original letter to Mam on political topics to Mr. Weiss.

The family's idea, as near as Tom could gather, had apparently been that Tom should join his cousin David in working for the bilingual newspaper _Fáinne an Lae, _which was the latest incarnation of the Gaelic League newspaper _An Claidheamh Soluis, _at which his late cousin Danny (not to speak of leaders of the 1916 Easter Rising such as Pádraig Pearse) had also worked. Unsurprisingly to Tom, this plan was not working. Tom's Gaeilge, which had, in its day, been sufficient to curry favor with the old ladies in the Gaeltacht around his grandfather's tenant farm in Galway, was woefully inadequate to serve as any sort of enticement to a potential employer, let alone to overcome his total lack of newspaper experience (other than the common _'won't you help us fill up our pages for free'_ letter writing.)

However, with a never-say-die attitude worthy of his prospective bride, the family had not given up on Tom's career as a newspaper man: they merely transferred their attentions to English language papers. Tom did not understand how Mr. Weiss had come into it, since he was from a Yiddish language paper, but the man shared some intriguing ideas, and Tom wanted to hear more from him.

Both Sybil and Tom were finding that looking for a job from three hundred miles away was no easy affair. With Mam's help (she and Sybil were still exchanging mail under cover of letters addressed to Tom so that Sybil would not have to explain why she was receiving mail from Ireland) Sybil had made initial contacts with most of the medical facilities in Dublin, and could now boast a half-dozen invitations to come and talk upon her arrival in the city, which seemed to be as far as they could get to finding employment for her from this distance away, because medical assessments (unlike writing) can really only be made in person. It made Sybil impatient for them to be on their way, but also increased the need for Tom to become gainfully employed before they moved, because otherwise they were going to be forced to rely solely on their savings and the support of Tom's family, which Tom had cautioned her was not likely to be unlimited if they intentionally did things to make themselves a burden (such as coming to Dublin without either of them having a job lined up). So, however impatient the young couple might be, they needed to continue to wait.

_'Now you know how I felt all that time waiting for your answer,' Tom told his fiancée somewhat smugly when she complained about how long it was taking. _

_'And __**this **__is your revenge?' she asked. 'Isn't it hurting you as much to wait as it is me?'_

_Tom looked down at the desk, at the stack of letters he'd written that morning that were waiting to go out with the evening post, at the letter he'd been writing when she'd walked into the office alcove in the garage, suddenly ashamed of himself. 'I'm used to waiting,' he'd murmured, sorry he wasn't able to do better for her. He knew what __**would**__ produce a faster result. 'I'll write to Mam and ask her to help me find a job as a mech—'_

_'No.' Sybil cut him off firmly._

_'But, I—' _

_'Tom, look at me.'_

_He moistened his lips. He __**really **__did not want a scolding right now. Sybil's order remained in the air however, and he supposed he deserved it. He sighed, and looked up at his fiancée obediently, though he dreaded to see the disappointment he knew she must feel in him. _

_When he saw the expression on his fiancée's face, his breath caught for a moment. It was a look of such love, and contentment, and joy—he'd done __**nothing **__to deserve such a look. _

_Sybil leaned down to kiss him, then straightened up again, smiling and shaking her head, which made her earrings dance. God, he loved her __**so much. **__'Don't give up yet, Tom. We're going forwards, not backwards. I'm not so impatient as all that. We'll get there. We're a long way from being beaten yet.' By the time she left to go back to the house, he was smiling after her. _

Tom heard someone clear his throat. He looked towards the open doorway of the alcove towards the main part of the garage.

"Mr. Pratt," the chauffeur said in surprise.

"Mr. Branson."

Mr. Branson waited to hear what his reluctant sometimes colleague wanted, but the older man said nothing more.

"Can I help you, Mr. Pratt?"

Mr. Pratt pursed his lips in the expression Mr. Branson was used to seeing whenever he had to ask Mr. Pratt to make a trip for him. It had been slow lately, though, with the poor weather. Mr. Pratt hadn't been asked to do anything for the garage since he'd been commandeered to help Lady Edith during Mr. Branson's 'illness.'

Mr. Pratt licked his lips. "I hear you're taking Lord and Lady Grantham to Leeds this evening."

"That's right," Mr. Branson confirmed.

"I could make the trip for you, if you'd like," Mr. Pratt offered.

"You could make the trip for me," Mr. Branson repeated, stupefied.

"If you'd like," Mr. Pratt confirmed.

Mr. Branson considered. In the six years Branson had been at Downton, Mr. Pratt had _never _volunteered to make a trip by motor. Leeds was too far to go by carriage.

"You want to take Lord and Lady Grantham to Leeds _in the motor_?" Mr. Branson queried, just to make certain his hearing was not defective.

Mr. Pratt was looking away, down towards the corner of the room. He frowned darkly. Mr. Branson knew without looking that there was nothing over there that would warrant the coachman's disapproving attention. "Yes, I do," Mr. Pratt muttered.

"Why?" Mr. Branson breathed, a great emphasis on the initial _wh _sound.

Nettled, Mr. Pratt looked back at the chauffeur. "M' mother's moved to Leeds. Thought I'd stop in to see her."

_'Mr. Pratt has a mother?'_ Well, he'd never spoke to Mr. Pratt about Mam, either, so he guessed they were even. "I've no objection, as long as his lordship has none." When he saw Mr. Pratt's expression, he continued, "I'll go ask him, and then come let you know, all right?"

Mr. Pratt nodded. "Thank you, Mr. Branson." The coachman left. Branson shook his head in surprise. So Mr. Pratt was human, after all. He'd always wondered.

* * *

Lord Grantham objected neither to the substitute driver nor to Pratt's slipping off during the dinner to see his mother. On his way back through the house, Mr. Branson met Mr. Bates in the corridor, and realized that for once both of them would be 'free' this evening.

"Mr. Bates, would you care to step out to the pub for dinner this evening? I hear there're to be beef pasties, and they serve a very fine sweet cider," Mr. Branson invited.

Mr. Bates looked surprised. "Won't you be in Leeds?"

The chauffeur smiled. "Nope. Seems Mr. Pratt has business in Leeds with his mother."

"Well then," Mr. Bates agreed, "I'll see you once they've left." The two friends smiled at the unexpected treat, nodded at each other, and parted until that evening.


	21. Chapter 21

**Author's Note: ** I have to keep reminding myself what this story is about.

**Disclaimer: **I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

"This must be your 'local,'" Mr. Bates remarked as the two men walked into the village that evening, their footsteps and Mr. Bates' stick crunching in the rime of frost that covered the ground.

It appeared that Mr. Branson had at long last recovered his normally buoyant spirits: he laughed. "More my secondary," he demurred.

Mr. Bates shot a sidelong glance at his smiling companion. "What do you mean by that? Isn't it the only public house in the village?"

Mr. Branson pursed his lips in an unsuccessful effort to prevent their corners from curling up and giving him away. He scuffed his feet along the path like a little boy, carving long strips out of the frosty surface.

"What have you been up to?" Mr. Bates accused, though his tone was still good natured.

"Nothing." Mr. Branson was the picture of false innocence.

"Where have you been going often enough for it to be your 'local' that isn't in the village?"

The younger man looked at his friend archly. "You've no need to act so superior, Mr. Bates. You've been known to frequent the place yourself."

Mr. Bates actually stopped walking in order to lend greater force to his denial. "I have not—" he began.

Mr. Branson was almost doubled over. "How quickly they forget."

"You are completely mad."

"No need for either of us to be angry," Mr. Branson punned. "There's no shame in it."

"What are you on about? There's no _truth _in it," the valet retorted.

Mr. Branson resumed walking, meanwhile explaining, "It has a very dignified landlord, outwardly strict to hide his kind heart, and two landladies, one of them a fiery redhead who—"

"The servants' hall you mean?" He supposed it must seem like a pub to the chauffeur at that.

"The Sign of the Green Baize Door," Mr. Branson agreed.

* * *

The food and drink were as excellent as Mr. Branson had promised. Mr. Bates had not spent much time in the Grantham Arms: the valet no longer drank, and besides had free run of 'The Green Baize Door,' unlike the chauffeur, who was allowed in the servants' hall only on sufferance and under the guise of some sort of legitimate business. However, he could not fail to notice that while the young man might have denied the Grantham Arms the appellation of his 'local,' it was plain the boy was a well-liked and trusted regular at the village's only inn.

Men stopped to chat with them for a few minutes, about the news, the peace conference, their cars—one man even asked Mr. Bates a question about men's fashions. One young man played songs on the battered old piano, and various patrons wandered over to sing. At one point, they played a song he knew, so Mr. Bates joined in, and saw that Mr. Branson was singing, too: _"… her eyes are like the starlight, and the white clouds match her hair, Sure Ireland must be Heaven, for my mother came from there."_

There were periods though when the two Downton servants were allowed to converse privately in low tones. During one of these lulls, Mr. Branson said, "Can I ask you something, Mr. Bates?"

"You may ask," Mr. Bates agreed.

"It's impertinent." Mr. Branson warned him.

"Is that right?" Mr. Bates tone was smoothly challenging. "Does that mean you've changed your mind about asking?"

Mr. Branson bit his lip, and looked down momentarily, then his eyes met his friend's again. "I haven't changed my mind, Mr. Bates."

"So ask."

"When you left… that time… with your wife…"

Mr. Bates waited patiently, but Mr. Branson said nothing more. "Is there a question coming?" the older man prompted, evenly. The valet really was as expressionless as a wooden plank sometimes.

The chauffeur swallowed nervously, bit his lower lip again, and nodded. "If I may…"

"I've already given you permission," Mr. Bates repeated.

Involuntarily, Mr. Branson looked away again. He _could not _look at his friend and still ask this. "… his lordship was angry?"

"What do you think?"

The chauffeur was looking at the rings countless wet mugs had left on the table. "I think he was."

"You are correct." Mr. Bates listened to the pub noises and looked at his friend's bowed head. "Is that all you wanted to know?"

It was hard to hear the boy when he was looking down like that. "But later he went to find you and ask you to come back?"

"You know the answer to that as well as I do: you drove him."

"So he forgave you… ?" Mr. Branson's voice probed, uneasily.

"Look at me, Mr. Branson." Mr. Bates watched the boy's head come up obediently. He held the younger man's frightened eyes for a long time without speaking.

Mr. Branson did not turn away again, but when it became plain Mr. Bates was not going to answer, he nodded apologetically. "I'm sorry, I've no right to—"

"I don't think it was so much that he forgave me, as that he decided it was _his _fault, rather than mine."

Mr. Branson rubbed his forehead. Mr. Bates sensed this was not the answer he wanted. The boy sighed. "Was he right?"

"About what?" Mr. Bates was momentarily confused.

"Was it his fault?"

Mr. Bates considered. "I don't think so. I didn't tell him why I was leaving, after all. It wasn't unreasonable for him to be angry… does that help?"

Mr. Branson looked momentarily trapped but was rescued by a young man who came up and asked to be shown some dance steps 'again.' The chauffeur escaped the awkward conversation he himself had initiated, and the two young men performed a simple jig to the amusement of the other occupants of the pub.

Mr. Bates watched his friend dance, and wondered what the boy had done that he thought would make Lord Grantham angry. The valet was curious, but on the whole, he hoped the problem was all in the boy's head and that he would never find out what the conversation they had just had had really been about.

When Mr. Branson returned to the table, the two men discussed only neutral topics, and did not refer to what they had been discussing before the dancer had interrupted them.

* * *

At last call, Mr. Branson walked up to the bar to get a final glass of beer for himself and one of cider for Mr. Bates.

George, at the bar, had pulled a pint for himself as well, and clicked his glass against Mr. Branson's. "Mr. Jarvis," he said.

Mr. Branson smiled. "Mr. Jarvis," he agreed.

Mr. Bates noticed that this name was being repeated by _all _the men. The chauffeur handed the valet his cider. "Mr. Jarvis, Mr. Bates."

"What does that mean?"

"It's the toast for last call."

"Mr. _Jarvis_?" The valet repeated in bewilderment. "_Our _Mr. Jarvis?"

The chauffeur smiled and nodded.

"Why?"

"It's traditional."

Mr. Bates shrugged. "Mr. Jarvis, then, I guess." They drank up and left the pub.

* * *

"Why do they toast Mr. Jarvis at last call?" Mr. Bates asked on the way home.

"They're grateful to him."

"To his lordship's agent? I thought they held the pub freehold."

"They do."

"So why are they grateful?"

"Because it was that very new and inexperienced agent who persuaded his lordship's father to solve a few of his more urgent financial problems back in the early '80s by selling them that fortuitously unentailed piece of property for ready money."


	22. Chapter 22

**Disclaimer: **I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

While Tom and his family continued to vet virtually every newspaper in Dublin, Tom had continued his correspondence with Mr. Weiss, who had apparently appointed himself Tom's schoolmaster.

_'Just what exactly is this story __about__, Tom? Would you mind telling me?' _Natan's most recent letter ran. _'You're going on and on, but you're not getting to the point. Get it done, you aren't Charles Dickens here, no one is paying you by the word, spit it out already!' _

Tom sighed, rubbed his eyes, fingered the copy of E.H.L. Watson's _Hints to Young Authors_ the family had sent him, and pulled his writing tablet to the center of the desk, while trying to organize his thoughts for yet another attempt.

_'Dear Natan,' _he began, _'The story is about the reasons Ireland should be accepted as a country in her own right…'_

* * *

Early one morning, as spring was at last showing signs it might actually consider arriving, Sybil came out to the garage to see her fiancé. Tom glanced up from his writing when he heard her footsteps. Automatically, he started to rise.

"Don't get up," Sybil told him. She walked up to his chair and bent to kiss the top of his head. "How's it going?"

"Grand," Tom said, but his irritated tone gave the lie to the word. "I've had another job offer."

"What?" Sybil turned him to face her. Judging from his expression, it _wasn't _good news. "What's the matter, Tom? Is it another… _mechanic's_ job?"

The young couple had had a MAJOR fight several weeks before, brought on by Tom's mother's having found him what she considered an excellent position as an auto mechanic quite close to her in Dublin, and Sybil's refusal to allow Tom to accept the job, insisting he wouldn't free Ireland from Great Britain by repairing cars.

Tom knew Sybil's logic was correct, but he hated delaying their marriage even further, and his reward for his reluctant but politely worded refusal was a scathing letter from his mother, inveighing against his rank stupidity, and calling on Jesus, Mary, Joseph, her patron St. Brendan, his patron St. Telemachus, and indeed the entire Communion of Saints to tell her what sin she could possibly have committed to be saddled with such a pair of unrepentant nitwits as himself and his Lady. Did they think it would be EASY to find employment in a city where a goodly portion of the population _emigrate_ every year due to the INABILITY TO FIND WORK?! It was foolish BEYOND PERMISSION to refuse so good a situation, for which Tom was SO WELL QUALIFIED in favor of this MAD DREAM of becoming a journalist. How was it that nursing was a good enough job for Lady Sybil, yet being a mechanic WASN'T good enough for her CHAUFFEUR OF SIX YEARS?! No doubt he and Sybil would be HAPPY to wait until they were CENTENARIANS before finally being wed… on second thought, weren't _imbeciles_ prohibited from marrying at all?

Tom hadn't even been able to be offended by this diatribe, because he privately agreed with every word: he was clearly a complete and utter moron.

All Tom said now was, "No, it's not a mechanic's job, it's a newspaper job. At _Natan's _paper."

Sybil cocked her head thoughtfully. Unfortunately, she was wearing stud earrings this morning. Tom liked seeing the dangly ones dance when she moved her head. "Isn't Natan's paper in _Yiddish?_"

"That's right," Tom agreed. He sounded angry, but she knew he liked Mr. Weiss a lot.

"Oh, Tom, I'm sorry."

Tom sighed. He put his left elbow up on the desk and rested his chin in his left palm. "I know he meant it kindly, as a joke to cheer me up, but I wish he hadn't… I think I would _love _to work for him," he admitted, the angry tone melting into its true nature: sorrow and regret. Tom moved his head so it was his forehead resting in his palm.

Sybil started to comb her fingers gently through his rumpled hair by way of comforting him.

"Please don't," he told her quietly.

Sybil jerked her hand off his hair. "You don't want me to touch you?" she asked, partially hurt and partially sick and tired of his perpetual self-pity. She hadn't found a job either, but was _she _moping?

To her surprise, he growled, "You're welcome to touch me any time, woman. I just don't want you playing with my _hair_ when you could be kissing me!" He somehow managed to twist around and grab her so that, before she knew what he was about, she was seated in his lap. She fit there surprisingly well, though she had to bend her head down a bit for her lips to meet his. He was hungry for her, and she was eagerly welcoming.

A half hour or so later, when they were forced to stop for air, Tom leaned back to look at her, and he no longer seemed depressed. "This waiting is sheer torture, love," he said.

Sybil leaned down to kiss him again, her tongue marveling at the smoothness of his lips. "Delicious torture," she murmured in agreement. Then she pulled back, putting up a hand to rub her eyebrow, a thoughtful gesture. "Have you replied to Natan yet?"

Tom shook his head. "No, I haven't."

"Why don't you ask him to help you find a job at an English language paper?"

"Surely he'd have done that already if he could?"

"Tom." She stretched the single syllable of his first name out in a distinctly warning tone.

"I'll ask him."

* * *

When Natan Weiss read Tom Branson's response to his offer of work, he bellowed so loudly that his wife Rachel ran in from the kitchen to see if he was hurt.

"Natan, what is it? What's wrong?"

Her husband had torn the letter in quarters and flung the offensive scraps of paper across the room. He was so angry all he could do was point at them by way of explanation. His anger, however, was directed at himself. _How could he have been so stupid? So blind? For all the young man's talk of equality, he was marrying a titled English aristocrat, for pity's sake! Any fool could see what he was!_

To his wife, Natan said only, "Tell your friend she was wrong about her son. He won't lower himself to work for a son of Abraham!"

* * *

Not knowing what else to do, Rachel gathered up the discarded pieces of Tom's letter and went to see her friend Brenna.

Dara opened the door. "Mrs. Weiss? Are you alright, ma'am? You're white as a sheet, let me—"

"Is Widow Branson here?"

"In the kitchen. She—"

But Rachel had run past the girl to find her friend.

* * *

"He did _WHAT_?!" Brenna's bellow was almost as loud as Natan's had been.

"He turned down the job Natan offered," Rachel repeated.

She would KILL him. She had brought the ingrate into this world, and she would take him out again! But it wasn't Rachel's fault her ijit son was forcing her to commit filicide. "Did he give any reason, Rachel?"

"That he didn't want to work for a Jew."

Brenna stared at her friend. Then she began to shake her head. "Rachel, that can't be."

"It was what Natan said—" Rachel fumbled in her pocketbook, "I have the letter here—"

"Tommy's letter?"

Rachel nodded. She found the crumpled papers and handed them over. Brenna smoothed them out on the table. "_'Dear Natan,'_" she read, "_'I appreciate your kind offer of work more than you know, but I'm very much afraid that if my Irish language skills are poor, my Yiddish ones are nonexistent… I wonder, though, if you would be able to help me to find work with an English language newspaper…'_"

Brenna felt tears prick her eyes. _'Oh, God, it's true… What did those English do to the boy?'_ Brenna was looking at the rest of the letter. It was _long_, full of conversation, random thoughts, curious bits of news, and even what appeared to be a sample writing assignment, just as if he had _not _begun his missive with a deadly, friendship-ending insult. Could it be? The boy really was a dope at times, after all.

"Dara!" Brenna yelled suddenly, making Rachel jump. "Is the post here?"

Dara and Brenna met in the doorway and fumbled together with a stack of letters, while Rachel looked on in astonishment. Brenna's first prayer was answered: one of the letters was from her son. She tore it open eagerly. As she read what her son had written to _her_ about Natan's job offer, she began to laugh. St. Telemachus did indeed watch out for his own with tender care.

"What does it say?" Rachel asked.

"He tells me your husband tried to cheer him up by offering him a job on his Yiddish language paper for a joke… he says Natan is a true scholar, he admires him very much, but the joke breaks his heart, because he can't think of any man he'd rather work for."

"Then why?"

"It sounds to me like the fool either didn't know or or failed to grasp that it was a job on Natan's English language _Irish Intelligencer_ he was being offered. Let's go talk to Natan and get the matter straightened out."


	23. Chapter 23

**Disclaimer: ** I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

The early post that day brought Tom a letter from Mam and a parcel from Natan Weiss. Tom opted to flout tradition and open the parcel first. It contained a letter and a newspaper. Tom looked at the newspaper. It was a weekly paper entitled the **_Irish Intelligencer_** and appeared at a cursory perusal to be distinctly republican in outlook. He set it down and looked at the letter. _'Dear Tom, I apologize for the misunderstanding. The job I am offering you is with my English language paper…'_

* * *

Sybil breezed into the garage after breakfast, this being one of the times of day when the family noticed her absence the least. "Tom, can you drive me to Ripon tomorrow? I want to—"

"No."

The flat refusal was unprecedented. Sybil's brow furrowed. Perhaps he was out of sorts. She licked her lips. "Well, how about the day after—"

"No."

The chauffeur's fiancé gave him a frustrated look. "What does that mean?"

A single corner of his mouth curved up in an expression she had never seen before. When he spoke again, the pitch of his voice had dropped, and his accent was more pronounced. "You don't know what _'no'_ means, milady?"

"This isn't funny, _Branson_," she snapped back. "Even if we're engaged, you're still the chauffeur until we leave here, so just tell me when you can drive me to Ripon."

He shrugged. "If you really must go, I guess we can try to fit it in today, otherwise I won't be able to take you—"

"Why n—"

"Unless we go by train," he finished happily.

Suddenly, Sybil forgot how to breathe. Her lips formed the word _'Tom—'_ but without air behind it, there was no sound.

"Breathe, darlin'," Tom reminded her. "Take a big breath, then you can talk."

She sucked in a breath, her eyes like saucers. "What are you saying?"

Tom handed her the newspaper. She stared at it, wild-eyed, afraid to comprehend what it meant. "It's a newspaper, Tom. What has it got to do with driving to Ripon?"

"What language is it in, love?"

She actually had to look at it again to tell. "English."

Tom nodded, smiling, willing her to understand.

Sybil's face burst into radiance, like a star gone nova. "Tom?" The husky voice shook; happiness, hope, disbelief, and elation combined into a dizzying euphoria.

"**That**," he confirmed, "is Natan's paper."

Suddenly, Tom's arms were filled with a **_squealing _**Sybil. Who no longer wanted to go to Ripon. He shifted his glorious burden, then sat down with her seated on his lap, while her arms gripped his shoulders like she would never let him go again.

He felt his lower lip gingerly with a cautious tongue. "I sincerely hope you've no objection—"

"Of course not!"

"I'm very relieved to hear it, because Mam writes as well saying if I don't accept _this _position, she'll come to England herself and break my fibulae and tibiae with her stick."

* * *

It was a _very _busy day. Now that Tom had a job, he would brook no further delay in announcing their engagement, and Sybil agreed with him. They had early on decided that Mary's recommendation that the whole family be told at once was a good one, so Sybil asked Tom to come into the Drawing Room after dinner for the purpose, since that was when the family was always assembled.

As a precaution, Tom packed and moved his belongings to the Grantham Arms, the publican (flattered at being taken into their confidence) having assured Tom that since he was not Lord Grantham's tenant, his lordship could do nothing to stop Tom from staying there.

In order to allow the family at least a little time to get used to situation before Sybil and Tom were actually gone, it was decided that Sybil would stay at Downton for a week, which would place her departure well after the wedding of Matthew and Lavinia which would be celebrated in only three (3) days. If there was any problem, the couple would leave for Dublin together immediately.

They tried to anticipate every possible scenario, every way that things could go wrong, and plan what each of them should do in response. The lesson of their elopement had been well learned. They would not be caught flat-footed again.

By teatime, everything was as ready as the young couple could conceivably make it. Fortuitously, Matthew, Lavinia, and old Lady Grantham were all to dine at the big house. Lavinia would drive herself and Matthew, but Branson would have to bring the dowager, then leave it to Edith or Pratt to drive her home…. _after. _Unless a miracle occurred in the Drawing Room.

"Tom," Sybil apologized as they vetted possible outcomes, "I'm sorry it's going to be so difficult."

"It's not your fault," he comforted her. "It's mine. If you were marrying someone else, you wouldn't have to go through all this."

"These things are sent to try us… and anyway, it's really my fault more than yours, they're _my_ family, and anyone can see you'd be quite a catch for _any_ woman."

Tom smiled at her, flattered in spite of himself, while Sybil continued, "I'll let Mary and Edith know while we're dressing, so there'll be at least two friendly faces there for us."

Tom nodded. He exhaled slowly, nervous.

"You know when to come in?" she asked.

"After I see his lordship and Mr. Matthew go through to join you ladies."

Sybil nodded. They were ready. The two young people put their arms around each other, just to rest for a moment. Both were trembling. They drew strength from trying to offer love and support to each other.

"Tom," Sybil finally said.

"Yes, my darlin'?"

"This is even harder than eloping was, isn't it?"

He took a deep breath, then exhaled loudly, both a chuckle and a sigh. "We haven't even _begun_ the hard part yet, love."

"Tom, sweetheart." His eyes brightened as they met hers, and the heart she had pronounced sweet warmed at the unusual endearment. "Tom," she repeated, "I want you to know, if they cast me off tonight, it won't have been too high a price to pay."

* * *

Tom was already standing obliquely behind the glass doors of the outer hall where he could see without being readily seen, feeling odd in a regular suit instead of his uniform, when the ladies themselves went through. Fortunately, it was not long before his lordship and Mr. Crawley crossed the Great Hall to join them. When the door had closed, Tom eased open the glass doors and followed. He laid his hand on the ornate doorknob. Once he went in, everything would change; there would be no way to go back as they had done after the elopement.

This was their Rubicon. It was now or never. Tom's heart was hammering. The knob under his hand was slick with his sweat. He breathed deeply. He could do this because Sybil had asked it of him, and for her he could do anything. He willed himself to be calm. Behind this door, he would find his heart's desire. Tom expanded his diaphragm and filled his lungs with blessed, sweet air, and performed the most difficult and heroic act of his entire life: he contracted the muscles of his arm, swung the door open, and stepped through it into the Drawing Room.


	24. Chapter 24

**Author's Note:** In theory, this story should have taken us from the door of Sybil and Branson's room at The Swan Inn to the door of the Drawing Room and then ended. In practice, certain denizens of Downton have proven to have plans and purposes of their own, so we have here a kind of oblique epilogue.

Lady Sybil announced to her father that she and Tom will marry in Dublin and that anyone who wishes to visit will be very welcome. Accordingly, I hope we will all meet soon in Dublin. If you have any thoughts on what we should do while there, please post them at my Tom Branson Fan Club in the Downton Abbey forum section. (Or just come and say hello. I'm very lonely there.)

However strange this is to say, I have enjoyed our journey through Purgatory. Never forget that all of the souls in Purgatory eventually enter Heaven with the help of your prayers. Thank you for reading, reviewing, following, and favoriting. I appreciate it. Truly.

And now to business: our final chapter is set the morning after Sybil and Tom's announcement in the Drawing Room, and takes place immediately after the scene in which Tom makes his own solo announcement in the Servants' Hall.

**Disclaimer:** I'm not even a custodian, my dears, let alone an owner. These characters and their settings are the work of others. I hope I do not offend with my homage.

* * *

The echo of Mr. Carson's valediction was still ringing in Mr. Branson's ears, even after he was back outside in the spring sunshine. _'...if you will go, Mr. Branson, we will continue with our day. Leave an address where we may forward what is owing to you.'_ Payment. The butler was concerned that both sides should pay they owed: the house in money, and himself in...

Mr. Branson kept walking, cutting across country since it was a shorter route back to the village than going entirely by the road. He closed his eyes for an instant. His fiancée's love offered partial protection, but could not save him entirely.

Mr. Carson would not 'disgrace' himself by discussing the matter. The butler's words, his _lack_ of words, hurt. Mr. Branson valued Mr. Carson's good opinion; he regretted its loss.

Mr. Branson had both hoped and feared to hear Mr. Bates' opinion, but the valet had not spoken, except with his eyes. Mr. Carson had forbidden any of them to speak and bid Tom go. Disobedience would not have improved the situation, only created more trouble, but the rejection was fully as painful as it was meant to be.

Tom raised a hand towards his chest, as though the gesture would soothe his aching heart. He reminded himself that Mr. Carson had every right to be angry. Branson had deceived the butler no less than his lordship. More even. He mentally added Mr. Carson to the penance Father Mark had given him regarding his lordship... and for all he knew he might have to add Mr. Bates as well... for as long as any of his three surrogate fathers were angry, he could do little except endure it. Not that that had much meaning, since he would be gone from Downton in a few days. But, perhaps one day, he and Sybil could come back to visit... and then he would see... if their anger had cooled... or if it would be time to pay the forfeit.

Tom shuttered. He had not enjoyed the punishment the butler had meted out for his aborted political protest involving Mr. Matthew's commanding general. On the other hand, it _had_ focused his priorities wonderfully, made plain to him that of all the things he hoped for, being with Sybil was the most important. _'So thank you for that, Mr. Carson.'_ He hoped that someday he could be grateful for _this_.

_ 'If you will leave, Mr. Branson...' _It was indeed a high price, as Sybil had predicted so long ago. Yet, as she had said only last night, it wasn't too high a price to pay. If he was leaving, she was coming with him, and that was what mattered. Still, as he remembered the well known faces, turned away, or turned towards them, angry, or shocked, or just uncomfortably embarrassed, the faces of both those he'd served and those he'd served with, he found himself murmuring, "Blessed Virgin, _mater miseracordiae_, please help them to come around."

"Branson!"

There was one of those faces now. Branson had arrived at the point where his shortcut met the main path to the village. Ms. Lavinia Swire stood frozen before him, openmouthed.

Branson stopped walking. "Miss Swire," he greeted her, raising his hat like any chance met acquaintance in the street.

Miss Swire had been heading up to the great house. There were things to be done for the wedding, now only two days off, and gifts had been arriving for some time. Miss Swire had in fact been thinking about Branson as she walked, about how much he must love Lady Sybil to have walked right into the drawing room that way, and how much Lady Sybil must love him to ask him to. Lavinia did not think she herself could have done it. The Crawleys terrified her even now as the untitled daughter of a solicitor engaged to the heir; she couldn't begin to imagine how she would manage if she had been a chauffeur. She grinned a moment imagining herself chauffeuring the Dowager Countess in her little Maxwell. She'd be so distraught she'd no doubt drive them into a tree. So when Lavinia saw that her thoughts had actually conjured Branson up in the flesh, his name popped out of her mouth before she thought.

While he was greeting her, Lavinia's internal monologue had nevertheless continued unabated, 'And if _Matthew_ had been the chauffeur he'd have told me couldn't allow me to 'sacrifice' myself, not snapped at my father that he should give me credit for _knowing my own mind_.' Did he even know she had a mind? Lavinia winced at the disloyal thought.

Branson, still waiting for her to speak, supposed her grimace to be a variation of the cut direct. _'I'll get used to it,'_ he thought in resignation. He lowered his eyes submissively and said aloud, "Right. I'll go." He started off.

"Wait!"

He stopped and looked at her curiously.

"I just... wanted to say... congratulations on your engagement."

Now it was Branson who froze. Miss Swire had barely _looked_ at them last night! She was _congratulating _him? _'That's quick work, O Queen of Heaven,'_ he thought, irreverent in his sudden delight.

"I know I should have said something last night—"

The cuts of Mr. Carson's inflicting were healing fast under the balm of Miss Swire's sympathy. As if he and Sybil could reasonably have expected her to take up their cause against Sybil's family. Branson smiled in genuine amusement.

"—but I regret to say," Miss Swire was continuing, "I'm rather afraid of Lord Grantham."

Branson's smile fled, replaced by a look of concern. "You've no need to be afraid of him, miss," he reassured her gently, "His lordship is a good man."

Her brow furrowed in bewilderment. "But last night the two of you were yelling—"

His smile crept back onto his face somewhat sheepishly. "I was feeling a little defensive last night. I'm afraid I've made a lot of people I respect very angry... but I'm hoping they won't stay angry forever."

"Are you and Lady Sybil quite sure of what you're doing?" she asked, not condemning, just concerned.

"Yes."

_'Yes.'_ Lavinia thought, enviously. _'So simple, so confident, absolutely certain they can manage stepping into a whole new world.'_

Lavinia wished she herself could answer so confidently. She wondered if he were as sure as he appeared. "Won't Lady Sybil's life be very different?"

"That's what she wants: to be an ordinary person, instead of a princess in a tower."

Lavinia _was_ an ordinary person, but the change she was making by marrying was the opposite way and _not _because it was what she wanted. "Branson, I can't... I'm sorry, I can't... I'm not really any help to you."

"You _have_ been a help," he contradicted her.

"I mean, I can't help you with the others... Matthew says it's not for us to have an opinion."

Branson thought that only natural. "He won't want to go against his lordship."

"And I can't go against Matthew."

"I know." The former chauffeur's tone was kind.

"But I wanted you to know, if that it were up to me—"

Branson smiled. "Thank you, Miss Swire. I'm very touched. Truly." He paused, then said, "Thank you for letting me take care of your car."

"Surely I should be thanking you for that?"

"Perhaps."

Miss Swire pursed her lips a bit. "Thank you for taking care of Maxwell."

"You're welcome. It was my pleasure."

They were silent a moment. "I should go," Branson said softly.

"They'll be expecting me at the house," Miss Swire agreed. She started to pass him, then stopped again for an instant. "Goodbye for now, but I'll look forward to seeing you up there, sometime."

_ 'From your lips to God's ears, miss,'_ he thought, but aloud he agreed, "Goodbye for now, Miss Swire. I'll see you one day up at the house."


End file.
